


The Butcher and the Beast

by Ser Smut (Mimsy)



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Anal Sex, Choking, Homosexuality, M/M, Mild Kink, Rape/Non-con Elements, Rough Sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-07
Updated: 2015-08-18
Packaged: 2018-04-13 10:34:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 9
Words: 30,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4518534
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mimsy/pseuds/Ser%20Smut
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Anders almost kills a mage girl, he flees the scene. Fenris follows, and punishes the mage's weakness. (***Mild NON-CON WARNING)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first attempt at a bit of a darker romance. Criticism welcome! Seriously, I need feedback.

“Oh, Maker, please! No…” the mage girl cried, backing away from a glowing and angry Justice.

 

Hawke was too far away to do a thing about it. All she could do was helplessly cry out Anders’ name as she reached out, moving too little, moving too late. Everything was in slow motion, Justice raising his gleaming staff, poised to strike…

 

In a blur of eerie light, Fenris put himself between girl and abomination. His sword raised to meet staff, competing glows flaring, the face of each twisted into pure fury. They held one another at impasse as Hawke quickly moved to drag the girl to safety, while Varric raised his hands to speak in soothing tones to them both.

 

“Hey now, we’re all friends here. We stopped the templars, and we can all just go have a nice friendly drink,” he spoke from a distance, not too keen on the prospect of either one turning fury onto him.

 

“I am friends with no one who stands in the way of Justice!” the alien, booming voice ushered forth, full of righteous fury. “I can see the taint of their influence upon you!”

 

Fenris snarled, standing his ground against the possessed mage. “You’re just like the Magisters, killing anyone who stands in your way. It’s laughable to call you Justice, abomination.”

 

Justice erupted with energy, forcing Fenris back several steps. Gathering energy, he raised his staff to call forth a torrent of lightning. Having expected something like this and through a lifetime of experiencing the atrocities of magic, Fenris was quick to recover and break through at that moment, lyrium bright as his hand sank into the mage’s chest.

 

The mage stopped dead in his tracks, drawing in a sharp breath. Fenris could feel the pulsing heat in his hand as his fingers enclosed over the mage’s heart. T’would be a simple thing, he thought bitterly, to end the abomination right here. This is madness.

 

As he was held just so, the divine glow faded, leaving in his wake a terrified Anders. As he came to himself, his trembling hands lifted to gently touch Fenris’ wrist, panicked gaze fixed on the elf. Fenris was sickened by him, his inability to control the spirit within him, and his general weakness of character. His grip tightened, a silent snarl on his face.

 

“Hey, hey...he’s back. You can stop now, Broody…” Varric pleaded, still unwilling to get too close.

 

Anders wheezed in his grasp, his eyes eventually slowly closing as he accepted impending death. As if to confirm it, he nodded to Fenris, tears now running over his burning cheeks.

 

That he accepted death in that moment infuriated Fenris. Fury melted into pure disgust, and he slowly withdrew his arm from the mage’s chest, much to the relief of Varric.

 

The moment he was released, he crumpled into a heap, hands at his face. Varric moved forward now to assist, but the mage shied away from his touch. “No...I...I nearly…”

 

“You nearly killed one of the very people you swore to save. How much further proof do you need that you are an abomination?” Fenris asked coolly, ice in his eyes and coating his tongue.

 

Varric scrambled to pick up the pieces of the situation, offering lamely, “But you didn’t. She’s fine now.”

 

“Only because…” Anders scrambled to his feet, a hand clutching at his chest, which still ached. “You...I...oh, Maker,” he sobbed, making a mindless, mad dash for the exit.

 

Varric started after him, only to be stopped by a hand clad in clawed gauntlet. “No. I will go. If he loses his mind again, I am better able to stop him. Stay with Hawke.”

 

The dwarf scowled, throwing up his hands in solemn vexation. The two parted ways now, Varric tailing after Hawke, and Fenris ghosting after Anders.

 

…

 

The mage stared down at his hands, huddled into his Darktown nook. For the first time since he’d joined with Justice, he was truly terrified of himself, and wondered if he might actually be becoming an abomination. What he had nearly done to that girl…

 

He had been aware of what was happening, peering out helplessly through his own eyes as another tugged at his strings like a mad puppeteer. Helplessness sank into his gut, doing nothing to quell his already burning insides. The ache from what Fenris had done lingered, a reminder of what steps had to be taken to stop him. He never thought he’d feel gratitude for the elf for being so...Fenris, but he did now. Had he not…

 

And it wasn’t just any innocent. It was a mage.

 

Scrambling to his feet once more, he crossed the clinic to his personal area, frantically tearing everything he owned out and away from the walls, piling it all into the center of the space. Sinking to his knees, all he could contemplate was fleeing as he sorted what he might be rid of for lighter travel.

 

As he rummaged through his pile of belongings, sorting what he might keep and what was trash, the face of the elf was burned into his mind. His mind traced over the hard line of his jaw, set with the anxious tension of mistrust whenever he deigned look at him. He had always hoped to show the elf the similarity between mages and slavery to gain his favor and soften the harsh opinions gathered in Tevinter. The connection could gain them both an ally in their desperately needed causes.

 

He hadn’t done a very good job of bridging that gap this time, had he?

 

He was likely near as disgusted with himself as the elf was. At least now Fenris wouldn’t have to hear his tirades.

 

…

 

Fenris had followed on his heels closely, not yet interacting with him or alerting him to his presence.

 

He had almost believed the mage’s claims of being in control, so well had the story been spun. What a fool he had been. No mage was capable of controlling a demon, least of all this weak fool.

 

If he was being honest with himself, he would admit that he held a deep attraction to the mage. He was...affected by his presence whenever they stood in the same room. It was something he was not, in fact, very honest with himself about because the found the way he was affected by Anders to be wholly disgusting. This was not just a mage. This was an abomination, and that was more clear now than ever before.

 

Every time the mage showed weakness, every time the demon within him burst forth in a rage, Fenris felt a grand measure of disgust not only for the mage, but for himself to hold such attraction to something so wrong and unnatural. He heaped the entirety of the blame on Anders, leaving none for himself.

 

He watched him now, seething in his rage at the creature who’d nearly killed an innocent, if one could refer to any mage as wholly innocent. He hated the mage’s weakness. He hated the thing inside him, inseparable from who he was. He hated him with every fiber of his being.

 

He often imagined himself using the mage to sate himself, then leaving him filthy and used. He wanted to hurt him.

 

When he realized the mage was sorting through his belongings to leave, he rasped in his cool baritone, “You aren’t going anywhere, abomination.”

 

Whirling around, Anders sat on his backside, scooting backward. “I...I can’t…” Fear gathered tears into his eyes. “I’m…”

 

“Weak,” the elf supplied.

 

Anders shuddered, turning back around to continue sorting through his belongings in quick and erratic movements. “I have to leave. Before I hurt anyone.”

 

Fenris sprang forward, a rough hand jerking on Anders’ shoulder, forcing him to turn. Pressing himself forward, he advanced quickly until he had the mage pinned by his wrists to the ground, the elf straddling his chest. The lyrium beneath his flesh illuminated dangerously, handsome features twisted into grotesque antipathy. “How easily you abandon your cause, mage. You’re nothing but a weak, whimpering coward. Run, if you must. Perhaps to Tevinter, where you are sure to fit in. You clearly have no qualms with slavery, some “Justice” you are.”

 

Anders was wide-eyed as the smaller male toppled him, pinning him back against the floor, making it impossible to shy away from his abuse. The elf was far stronger than he appeared to be, evident in the futility of the mage’s struggles to free himself. When he could not free himself, he turned his face away, breath strained over the large lump in his throat he could not swallow.

 

The elf was not only impossibly strong, but incredibly fast. A clawed hand released his wrist to draw back and slap the mage’s face sharply, tackling the flailing limb back to the floor immediately afterward.

 

Shock stole the fight out of him. He lie perfectly still for a moment, the slap still registering in his brain. Fenris watched him, immobilized and entirely at his mercy, and he felt a stirring in his loins that he dread. The more painfully aware of it he became, the more painfully aware he became of his proximity to the mage, the soft skin of his wrists, the full, pouting lips, parted in shock as they were. Lust maddened him, fueling the look of fury in his face.

 

Eventually, Anders spat out venomously, “It’s pretty rich that I’m being judged by a psychopathic, homicidal freak.”

 

“Which is my choice. You’re out of control, and very nearly murdered an innocent,” Fenris rasped in low tones as his eyes wandered hungrily over the restrained mage.

 

“You would murder a hundred innocents if it meant killing Danarius,” he retorted. “I am motivated on behalf of all my people. You only care for yourself.”

 

“Perhaps,” the elf admitted, lacking any shame in regard to it.

 

Anders’ face now twisted in disgust. “Get off of me. If you hate me so much, let me leave.”

 

Fenris brought his face closer to the Mage’s, a silent snarl immovable from his features. Anders refused to meet the intense gaze, his own disgust apparent, defiant now even as he wallowed in his misery.

 

It was a shock to them both when Fenris crashed his lips against the mage’s roughly, tongue diving into the gasp of shock it elicited. A sweet and earthy flavor washed into him, his grip on the mage’s wrists tightening until Anders let slip a whimper.

 

To his surprise, the mage sighed heavily into him, for a moment returning the cruel kiss with as much gusto as the elf had poured into it. At this he pulled away, casting himself backwards as though he’d been hit by a spell. A hand covered his mouth in bewilderment, and he could not help but wonder if the mage had forced him into his actions through blood magic. He knew he had not, and a small part of him wished that he had so that he might have something to blame it on.

 

The pair sat apart from one another, each ragged of breath, scowling downward in confusion, unable to look at the other for quite some time.

 

“What in Andraste’s name was that!?” the mage demanded at last, fingers curling into outraged fists.

 

Fenris quietly stood, not saying a word in response.

 

Anders himself stood as well, unwilling to let this one go. Circling around the elf to cut off his exit, he stood as a barrier. “No. You don’t get to come in here, kick me while I’m down, do that, then leave. What was that?”

 

He didn’t know. Maker help him, he didn’t know what he was doing. He chalked it up to weakness, and for the moment turned his loathing inward at last to himself. He knew not what to say, so said nothing, which seemed to infuriate the mage.

 

“Is this some sort of vengeance for what you suffered at the hands of Danarius? I seem to be the face of everything horrible about Tevinter and magekind to you. Is that why it seems to feel so right to you to beat me? Abuse me? To tear me down? To hold me down and...use me as you see fit?” Anders spat, daring the elf to respond.

 

Fenris shot him a dark and dangerous look, as feral and furious as it was sullen. His dark fantasy was given shape by the mage’s words, making the wrongness of it more apparent than before.

 

The mage continued, incensed by the elf’s silence. “That is it, isn’t it? That’s why you…” Tears stood in his eyes. “Maker, I can’t. Fenris, I’m so weak. You were right. I’m not strong enough to bear my own fury and yours. Not like this. I...”

 

For the first time, the elf’s fury faltered, and for a moment he appeared utterly helpless and vulnerable. He set a rough, calloused hand on the mage’s shoulder, unable to look him in the eye. “I…” He searched for the words, bewildered that he now somehow felt pity for the mage, guilty for what he’d just done. A flush of heat crept into his loins once more, instinct taking action where his mind could not.

 

His other hand lifted to press thin fingertips to his cheek trailing down to his chin. There his thumb pressed down, turning the tear-streaked face of the mage downwards for Fenris to once again claim his lips. It was more gentle this time, as though it were an apology for before.

 

Anders shuddered, hesitant at first, until suddenly bursting like a dam and delving his tongue into the elf’s mouth, arms coiling around his waist tightly. At the sudden enthusiasm, Fenris hardened in loin and feelings, releasing a low, feral growl as a hand lifted and entangled a clawed hand in his blonde hair, yanking sharply backward. It broke the kiss, exposing also a stubbled throat as the mage’s head tilted back with a cry. The elf enclosed his mouth over the exposed throat, teeth raking the skin.

 

Fenris pressed forward, Anders moving backwards to keep his balance, until the mage found himself pressed against a wall.  The elf put himself in full body contact with the other, pinning him with his weight. Nibbling his way down the salty-sweet flesh of his neck, Fenris found a tender parcel of meat between his neck and shoulder. Teeth sunk in, causing Anders to whimper pitifully, even as his neck craned to the side to allow the elf better access.

 

The show of submission pleased Fenris, a wicked, snarling sneer crossing his dark visage. The disgust for both the mage and himself never subsided, even as drunk on lust as he found himself to be. Indeed, it almost served to make the intoxication more potent.

 

“F-fenris!” Anders cried, as much in fear as it was a plea.

 

“On your knees, mage,” he commanded, breaking away from his neck to bath his sensitive earlobe in hot breath.

 

Anders tensed, an indignant scowl on his face. He opened his mouth to protest, but Fenris quickly silenced him with another fierce kiss, tongue wicking out the words he might have said. The elf dropped a hand to explore the mage’s inner thigh, tracing up and cupping hard over a hot, rock-hard rod pulsing with desperate need. Imminent protest was reduced to a moaning cry, the mage’s hands gripping roughly at Fenris for support, hips rocking forward to thrust his clothed length across the other’s broad palm.

 

“I’ll not repeat myself,” the elf warned, voice so low it sent a chill into the other.

 

Fenris lowered a hand to tug at the lacing on his own leggings, seeking to free himself from their binding. Anders, knowing what was being demanded, hooked a hand under the laces, brushing the elf’s hand away. Then, in a moment of wild defiance, he glared upwards at the other, flames wicking at his fingertips as a woven spell incinerated what he touched, obliterating the laces and leaving them ash.

 

The elf snarled at the burst of heat, infuriated at the use of magic. Seizing the mage by his hair with one hand, the other jerking the front of his leggings down to release his cock, he hissed, “Do not try that again.” The moment Anders opened his mouth to spit out a retort, he thrust himself between his full, parted lips.

 

The mage gagged at the sudden intrusion, hands lifting to press at the elf’s hips. With a low growl, he pressed the mage’s head against the wall to leave him no escape, roughing fucking himself deeper and deeper still into the constricting warmth of his throat. At first Anders struggled to keep from gagging and vomiting, tears streaking down his face as he fought his reflexes. Fenris watched his face as he struggled to take him in, maddened with desire at the sight of it. He practically purred out a groan, hilting himself and lingering there a moment, his length lurching and twitching as the gagging mage’s throat undulated over his shaft. When he thought the mage might lose the battle, the elf mercifully slid himself out, loathe to be away from the heat.

 

Anders gasped for air, coughing a bit before breath heaved through gritted teeth, fixing his defiant glare upon the elf. Fenris found himself swooning over the look on his face, a seething mixture of hatred and lust. The mage set a trembling hand over his own length, palm grinding roughly against it, as eager to indulge it as he was disgusted by it.

 

The mage lifted his other hand to curl his fingers into the front of the elf’s leggings, using them as leverage to tug him close, drawing his cock back into his mouth hungrily. Fenris was surprised at the sudden initiation, but found himself shuddering at the sensation.

 

With one arm braced against the wall above the mage, his free hand reached out, fingertips brushing somewhat lovingly over the trails his tears had left. The mage’s harsh features softened at the gentle touch, his glare easing into determined passion. Both hands fell to the lacings of his own trousers, tearing at them urgently to free himself.

 

When his hands fell away and his focus had shifted to his own needs, Fenris grunted in annoyance. Taking both armored hands and setting them at either side of his head, he began thrusting himself to the hilt roughly in Ander’s mouth.

 

Anders tried his best not to gag, albeit a touch unsuccessfully. Yet it did not seem to matter as much to him now, as he was far more concerned with seeing to his own burning need. He took himself in hand, pumping over his own length greedily, hips rocking against his palm.

 

Fenris pulled away, vacating the mage’s mouth to sink down to his level, snatching his wrists to pull his hands away from himself. “No,” he rasped. “You don’t deserve to be pleasured.”

 

The mage struggled to free himself, desperate to continue. “Please...please…” he pleaded, writhing in the agony of his own lust. “I...I...need…”

 

The elf set a hand over the mage’s throat, pressing just hard enough to constrict the blood flow, but not choking him in earnest. “No. If you find release here, it will be on my cock.”

 

Anders, finally recognizing utter defeat, closed his eyes, tears streaking down his face once more. “Yes. I...please…”

 

“No,” Fenris growled, seizing the mage by his feathered collar. “I please.” A clawed gauntlet lowered to clutch at the cotton trousers, ripping the fabric apart to fully expose every dark, private place the mage kept between his legs. Moving around to his side, he turned the mage’s backside to face him, Anders on his hands and knees before him. Though his cock still glistened with the juices from his throat, Fenris kindly spat in his hand, coating the mage’s clenching anus in saliva.

 

The elf pressed himself to the pucker, tracing its outer edge with the head of his cock.The mage visibly trembled, wantonly rocking back against him in eager anticipation. Fenris snarled, then sank himself into the impossibly hot depths of the mage. Anders cried out, tensing at first before forcing himself to relax, lest he risk injury.

 

Fenris groaned, leaning over the mage to shove his coat upward, exposing the small of his back. Offended by the scraps of trouser still attached near the top of his pants, he tore them away. A throaty purr showed his appreciation of the toned muscle of his backside, padded just enough with fat to round out the cheeks pleasantly.

 

When he’d worked his entire length into the mage, he paused for a moment, giving him a moment to adjust to the fullest in him. The broad shoulders of the mage shook, ruffling the feathers of his coat. Whether he was shuddering or silently weeping, the elf could not tell. He found himself wanting to check in, wanting to see if the mage was alright, yet a louder voice demanded that he did not care. That this was, after all, a mage.

 

Disgusted with himself once more, he began moving. He would draw himself out slowly, then slam back into the mage once, eliciting a whimpering cry from the other. Incensed by the weakness and vulnerability he detected in himself and witnessed openly in the mage, he began fucking his ass in earnest. He hammered into the tight heat with abandon, claws digging into the flesh of his hips.

 

Anders began bucking against him, the harsh edge of his cries softening as he began to find his pleasure in the roughness of the intercourse. Fenris  was as pleased by his enjoyment as he was enraged by it. The part of him that desired pleasure in equal measure for elation, while another, darker, louder voice expressed its disgust, wanting the mage to hurt. Wanting him to suffer.

 

Reaching back, the elf brought his hand down hard across the mage’s backside in a violent slap, a reddened handprint immediately visible from the blow. Anders’ back arched, a whimpering cry leaping from his throat. The mage trembled for a time afterwards, his bucking still by the smack.

 

Fenris pulled himself out of the mage, sneering down at the trembling weakness before him. “Turn over. I want you to look at me while I spill myself in you.”

 

Anders hesitated for a moment, then did as he was told. When he turned around, the elf saw how red his eyes had become with tears, cheeks moist, full lips drawn into a trembling pout, looking broken and lost as a child. Something moved in his heart, and the biting fingers of regret dug into his spine. Yet it was too late. The dark rage maintained its control, and it would not stop until it got what it wanted.

 

Pressing the mage to his back and lifting his legs, he sank himself into the other once more with a low growl, driving himself into him violently. From this new position, however, the mage’s eyes went wide, his cries becoming increasingly wanton. Anders’ legs coiled around Fenris, pulling him in urgently.

 

Propping himself up with one hand, the elf used the other to interlace in golden hair, curling long fingers until the hair was roughly taut in his grasp. He pulled the mage into a bruising kiss, muffling the howls of pleasure leaping now from his throat.

 

Perhaps somehow triggered by the mage’s lust, magic seeped from his swollen lips, sending electricity into the lyrium veins laid beneath his skin. What was usually painful was instead a tingling eruption of bliss. Startled and frightened by the magic there, he pulled away with a cry, snarling as he instead redoubled his efforts to fuck punishment into the abused ass of the mage.

 

Fenris set a hand over the mage’s throat, furious that he’d let magic slip out so, that he would activate the lyrium he loathed. It had left him feeling violated and vulnerable, perhaps much in the same way he was making the mage feel. Fury blinded him to the latter.

 

Anders clutched at the elf’s wrists, even as he began violently trembling, overwhelmed by both pleasure and pain. Fenris took his erection in his other hand, pumping his fist over it hard and slow, thumb encircling the tip, moistening it with his own dribble of leaked fluid.

 

At the touch there, Anders erupted, back arching as he shot thick ropes of seed onto himself. His cry was lost between a howl and a choked sob from the hand upon his throat, quaking as waves of pleasure swept him away. At the sight of this, and with the way his anus clamped down and milked the elf’s aching cock, it was not long before he spent himself as well, painting the mage’s insides white with hot, musky juices.

 

When he found his own pleasure, he released the mage’s throat, burrowing his face in the crook of the other’s neck, feathers brushing his cheek. As he spilled inside the mage, all he could smell was herbs, spices, and the salted sweetness of his skin. For a peaceful, blissful moment, all that existed in the world was that smell, and it felt like home.

 

The real world was not patient or kind, and it wrapped its arms around him like a jealous lover. Fenris sat up, chest heaving with breath, and peered down at the mage.

 

Anders could not meet his gaze. Instead, his knuckles were pressed to his mouth, doing his best to stifle his weeping.

 

“Mage,” he said, almost gently.

 

Anders squeezed his eyes shut, shaking his head. “Just...leave.”

 

“No.”

 

The mage turned bleary, red eyes to him, as pleading as they were bitter.

 

The elf slid his flaccid phallus from the mage, a hand touching his cheek gently, fingertips brushing at his tears.

 

“You got what you wanted,” Anders looked away.

 

“No, I did not,” he uttered in a low, sullen tone.

 

Fenris, now free of the rage for the moment, was left only with remorse for his actions. His heart sank as he watched the mage stifle his weeping, recalling the many times Anders had called him a heartless monster, a sociopath. A murderer. He had always reasoned that magic had left such scars upon his soul, but he wondered if that meant he was as weak a fool as any mage.

 

The mage was at a loss now, peering to him with questioning eyes, almost afraid to know the answer to what they asked. “I...please, I can’t...I can’t do it again…”

 

The elf scowled in disgust. “I can’t either. That isn’t what I meant.”

 

Anders sighed, moving to sit up. Fenris leaned into him, preventing him from doing so. Frustrated now, weary, and growing upset, he hissed, “What do you want from me?!”

 

Fenris searched his eyes for a moment, then slowly backed away, removing himself from the mage and allowing him to stand. Guilt ate at him, his disgust now at losing his head so badly. “Do you still intend to flee?”

 

The mage slowly stood, a hand gingerly touching the mark on his rear where he’d been slapped. It was beginning to turn darker in color. It would be an impressive bruise later. Wincing, perhaps from the pain of the mark, perhaps from the question, he muttered, “I don’t know.”

 

“Don’t,” Fenris knelt to tug at the lacing of his footwrap on his right foot, removing the leather thread.

 

Anders peered down at him in shock, “Wh...what?”

 

Fenris used the lacing from his footwrap to lace up his leggings, tucking the scrap of cloth into his pocket. He did not look to the mage. “You aren’t leaving,” he said simply, as though it were the only sensible answer.

 

The mage bristled for a moment, scowling at the other and speaking through clenched teeth, “I don’t see why I should stay.”

 

With his leggings only partially laced, his hands stilled their movements, his dark gaze leveling on Anders with brutal intensity. Abandoning his task, he strode towards the mage, upper lip curled in disgust. “So you’ll choose the coward’s path instead? Abandon your precious mages to their own fates?”

 

Anders backed away from him, wary of his proximity. “No, I...I can’t help them...I…”

 

“You mean you won’t. One moment of weakness, and you decide you’re weak all around. If that’s what you really think, then I whole-heartedly agree,” the elf spat.

 

“Isn’t that what you liked just now? My weakness?” the mage shot back, tone dripping with venom.

 

Fenris snarled, hands fisted at his side, trembling with anger. “Fool mage. You don’t know how maddening it is to want to hate you, but instead…”

 

Anders grit his teeth, then brought his hand sharply across the elf’s face with a loud slap. Fenris shifted his gaze slowly back to the mage, an eerie glow flaring to life along the veins of lyrium. It faded quickly, and the elf stood glaring at the mage in silence. Anders glared right back, daring him to hit back. “I think you’ve taken your cruelty far enough. You use me, and now you want to toy with my feelings?”

 

“I don’t expect you to believe me, and I do not expect forgiveness. I’ve had little for you, and have no right to any from you. It is clear to me now that I’ve had feelings for you that I myself was loathe to admit, and in clinging to rage instead, have ruined any shred of companionship I might have shared with you,” Fenris continued lacing up his leggings. “I cannot even say I would not treat you so roughly again should we...well. It is best I do not see you again. Stay, mage. Hawke needs you. You will not see me again unless Hawke has need of us both, and precious little even then.”

 

With that, the elf turned on his heel, leaving behind a bewildered mage.

 

 


	2. Freedom Means Being Alone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anders tries to help Fenris. It goes as well as he expected.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hehe, I said I'd post more if I got enough comments. Here you are, my lovelies.

Anders was amazed at Hawke’s compassion. Time and time again, she reached a helping hand out to the mages, brokering peace where she could. Perhaps it was Bethany that kept her so open-minded, even in the face of their mother’s death at the hands of a crazed blood mage.

 

Even her mage companions left little to have faith in. Anders himself was possessed by a spirit that stole away his free will in times of great injustice, sapping any shred of mercy or kindness the mage might have had. Merrill openly practiced blood magic, communing with demons in ways that made it astonishing that she had yet to become an abomination. Thankfully Hawke had had the good sense to keep the arulin-holm away from the girl.

 

Merrill. The very name left a foul taste in his mouth. Of all Hawke’s companions, she was the one he truly loathed. She was the very reason mages were so feared, and every breath she drew did nothing but damage their cause. He wished that accursed mirror would swallow her up and rid them of her. He imagined Fenris felt similarly.

 

At the thought of the elf, he leaned back in his chair, head bowed, a pained expression on his face. He did his best to think of something else, but once the gate had opened, the waters flooded in.

 

The elf had been true to his word. He had not spoken to him for months now, and he’d only seen him once when the Qunari invaded during the battle with the Arishok. The minute the fighting was over, he simply vanished, presumably back to his mansion in Hightown.

 

Anders had asked after the elf at the Hanged Man when he last saw Varric, but the dwarf had shaken his head, admitting that no one save Isabella saw Fenris outside of being called upon for his aid by Hawke. Varric had not spoken to him since the night Anders nearly killed an innocent mage, but he was kinder about describing the day than the mage.

 

When he had asked Isabella about the elf, he had become infuriated.

 

...

 

_“Fenris? Oh, he’s quite alright,” she smirked, eyeing the mage with amusement. “Very_ healthy _you might say.”_

_“What? You…” Anders trailed off, scowling at the buxom pirate._

_“Ooh, a girl shouldn’t kiss and tell, sweet thing,” she winked, downing her drink. “Maker knows I wouldn’t want anyone to get jealous.”_

_“I suppose not,” the mage replied flatly, entirely unamused. “Well, forget I asked.”_

_“I’ll tell him you asked after him, shall I?” she did her best to stifle a giggle._

_“I’d rather you did not,” Anders spat, storming out of the Hanged Man in a fury._

 

...

 

He had been so furious after that, and why? He should not care what the elf did with himself in his spare time, let alone with whom. He hadn’t wanted anything more to do with the bastard anyhow. Or at least, that was how he should have felt. Yet the thought of him with another flooded his heart with bile.

 

Once upon a time, he had had feelings for the elf. He had wanted them to find mutual understanding, to bond. He had respected him, admired him in a way, even if he had felt his opinions of mages were misguided. He had thought it had all ended on that night.

 

Justice was not pleased. The obsession was distracting him from his purpose, turning his righteous gaze toward selfishness and and indulgence.

 

The guilt it settled within mingled with jealously, lust, depression, and dread, and once again, his thoughts turned to that night. He could still feel those long, thin fingers coiled around his throat if he closed his eyes. A hand absently traced the line where his hand had been, burning need boiling upward until the heat flushed his cheeks.

 

Unlacing his trousers, he freed himself, taking his cock in hand roughly, imagining instead it were the gauntlet-clad hand of the elf that gripped him so tightly.

 

This is a distraction! a voice within him boomed, stilling his hand for a moment.

 

“Just let me finish,” he whispered into the dark room to himself. “I can concentrate if I can get rid of it.”

 

Surely we do not want the elf’s hands upon us again? He is an enemy to our cause! the thought was so strong he could almost hear the voice of Justice at his ear.

 

“No, I…” his trembling hand squeezed his cock hard. “...I just need to…”

 

He trailed off, now pumping himself furiously. He cursed how insufficient his own touch seemed to be, the protests of Justice doing nothing to assist in finding his relief. He could think of nothing but dark, beautiful Fenris, striking him across the face, closing a hand over his throat, punishing him for his weakness. Maker, he wanted to be punished for his weakness.

 

Setting a hand to his own throat, it was a poor substitute, used to enhance the fantasy anyhow. When he closed his eyes it was Fenris, choking him, snarling in fury with green eyes as brutal as his touch.

 

It was indulgent and sickening that he should have such fantasies, and he always later regretted pandering to desires he ought not to have. Yet in the moment, he allowed himself free reign in fantasy, hand at his throat sliding upward to dip into his mouth, thrusting his fingers in until he could feel the back of his throat, well practiced enough now from indulging his dark fantasies on his own that he no longer gagged.

 

When he’d coating his fingers well with the thick, viscous saliva of his throat, he slid his hand down, pulling his legs up and parting himself to press a digit inside. It slid in easily, prompting him to slip in another. Pumping so vigorously at his length, he could not properly penetrate himself, and could not get quite the right angle even if he tried. Still, it was enough, and soon he was spilling his own seed over his belly, teeth biting hard on his quivering lip to keep from calling out the name that haunted his dreams.

 

When it was over, he groaned, immediately regretting what he’d done. Disgusted with himself, he set his clothing aright again, erupting from the back room of his clinic to go for a walk. He needed to clear his head.

 

…

 

When he returned, he found Varric in the clinic on his way out. The dwarf stopping in surprise when he saw the mage. “There you are blondie. I was just looking for you.”

 

Anders took note of the vaguely concerned expression on the dwarf, becoming concerned himself. “Does someone need healing?”

 

Varric laughed nervously, shaking his head. “No, no, nothing like that. I just came across an interesting piece of information you might like to know.”

 

“Oh?” he asked, his curiosity piqued.

 

“Since you were asking about Broody a few weeks ago, I thought you might like to know he’s got a visitor coming to the Hanged Man tomorrow night,” Varric studied the mage, equal parts amused and thoughtful. “Apparently, it’s his sister.”

 

The mage was unsure how to react to this information. “I...see.”

 

“Look, you two obviously have something going on, and I just thought you’d want to know. I gotta tell you though, something isn’t right about this one. I just have a feeling…” Varric hummed. “Anyway, Hawke is taking me on a mission, so I won’t be around.”

 

“I...see,” he said again. “Does Hawke know?”

 

“No, I don’t think Broody’s actually told anyone,” he shook his head.

 

“Then how do you know about this?” Anders frowned.

 

“I’m well connected, Blondie,” the dwarf winked, now strolling out of the clinic. “Wish us luck with Daisy.”

 

“Merrill!? What’s that fool girl done this time?” Anders scoffed.

 

The dwarf shrugged, turning briefly to respond. “Hard to say just yet. I’ll tell you the story when we get back.” With that, he wandered off.

 

Anders stared after him for a time, slowly digesting the information he had received. First and foremost, it was apparent that this was all none of his business. He clung to this idea as he lit the hilanterns around the clinic, opening for healing work.

 

“No, no…” he muttered to himself. “None of my business. Nose is likely to get lopped off if I stick it where it doesn’t belong.”

 

Besides, Anders thought bitterly, maybe he could get his sweetheart Isabella to help him out.

 

…

 

Hours later, it would be a brusque young woman who would come to see him, carried in by a slender elven man who struggled with her weight. She was slurring cursed, clearly drunk, reeking of booze. Blood streamed down her face from a pronounced gash in her forehead, staining the leather of her armor.

 

Anders immediately moved to her side, assisting the elf with her weight. She was a bulk of muscle, and her drunken stumbling did not make it easy. Eventually they sat her down on a cot, the elf frantic as he rambled. “Please help her! This is my fault. This is all my fault. There’s...there’s so much blood…”

 

The mage examined the female, sighing, “Faces bleed quite a bit if you’ve been drinking. There may be nothing to worry about.”

 

The woman huffed. “I’ve ‘ad worse. Ain’t nothin’.”

 

“Lydia, I’m so sorry…” he held her hand in both of his.

 

“Pff. Would’er’ been nothin’ if ‘e weren’t one o’them Vint Mage-lords,” she spat.

 

Anders bristled at the comment, hesitating momentarily. Summoning a small but brilliant bit of flame, he waved it before her eyes, testing the dilation of her pupils. “What happened?” he asked, doing his best to focus on the task at hand.

 

She drunkenly watched the flame, appearing annoyed. “One o’them dogs up the arse of the Mage-Lord ‘ad ‘is paws up on my friend. Was gonna teach ‘im manners right proper, until ‘is shite master thumped me good with ‘em spells. Cheap shot it what.”

 

She had his full attention now. He bathed the blood from her face, cleaning the wound in preparation for sealing it. “...did this Vint Mage-Lord have a name?”

 

“Bugger if I know. S’when I got right fucked,” she hissed, barely reacting to the cleansing of her wound. This one was tough.

 

“I heard it, ser. There was a girl with him, called his name, asked him to stop beating my friend. I think it was...Danny-russ?”

 

Anders swore under his breath. “The girl. She was an elf.” He was not asking. It was too spot on to be coincidence. Anders knew before the elf said it.

 

“Yes,” he breathed. “Will Lydia be alright?”

 

Scowling, he set the cloth aside, setting a hand over her forehead, a glow emitting from his palm. “Luckily, she does not have a concussion. All she’ll feel tomorrow is a hangover.”

 

“Ther usual, then!” Lydia snorted in a short, brutish laugh.

…

 

Anders glared at the door to the Hanged Man, loathing that he was there. He shouldn’t have been. He certainly wouldn’t be thanked for his meddling, and Justice was none too pleased about it either.

 

With confirmation that Danarius was here, he knew the elf would be walking into a trap, and he just couldn’t abandon him to his fate. The best scenario would be that he was killed. At worst, the elf could find himself a slave once more, bowed and broken.

 

The mage pushed into the tavern resentfully, seating himself to the side of the bar, allowing him a full view of the premises. He was clothed in the hardened leather of a rogue, his short staff possessed of a handle and hilt, disguised as a sword in a large sheath. He’d commissioned the thing from the mage underground, seeking a means to carry a weapon without revealing himself a mage to anyone with eyes. The hood of his cloak was drawn up and over his head, casting shadows over his face. There were many at the Hanged Man on a fairly regularly basis who did not wish to be recognized, so he would draw little suspicion to himself dressed so.

 

He waited, sipping at the cheap swill they served at the bar. He hated the stuff, but he had to blend in. That meant drinking the same piss-flavored shite everyone else stuffed into their craw with a grimace.

 

There was only one female elf present, and she sat at the back, eyes fixed to the tavern door. He knew immediately this was the one claiming to be Fenris’ sister.

 

If this girl really was his sister, he wondered why she would be so eager to hand her own flesh and blood over to a Magister. She had to know what he would do to him. Perhaps he had been an awful brother, and she wished to see him pay for it. After what the elf had done to him, he would believe him capable of souring relations with his sister.

 

Yet she did not have the hardened look of someone seeking revenge. Rather, she looked genuinely remorseful. He wondered if she was doing this willingly, or was somehow being forced.

 

Pain twisted her smooth features, and she looked down, as though suddenly ashamed. Glancing to the doorway, he found Fenris.

 

The elf was alone, his face not hardened and cruel as the mage usually saw it, but a softness there. He almost looked hopeful. Anders felt his heart shatter at the sight of it. When he found out…

 

The girl looked up at him, her expression unreadable. When he finally came to stand at her side, she sighed, “...it really is you.”

 

“Varania?” he murmured, his voice so light. “I...I remember you. We played in our Master’s courtyard while Mother worked. You called me…”

 

“Leto,” she supplied wearily. “That’s your name…” She slowly stood, unable to meet his hopeful gaze.

 

Fenris grew concerned at the cold reception, inclining his head to peer into her face. He searched it for what he’d done wrong. “What’s wrong? Why are you so…?”

 

The mage could take it no longer. He stood, jerking back his hood and crossing to join the other two. Both were startled by his appearance, and Fenris quickly followed it up with a feral snarl. “What are you doing here, mage?”

 

“Hate me later,” Anders scowled, a hand resting on his staff. “Why don’t you ask her who else she brought along?”

 

“Wh-” Fenris started, but was abruptly cut off.

 

As if on cue, another man appeared, effectively silencing Fenris as a look of abject terror crossed his face. “Ah, my little Fenris. Predictable as always,” he gloated, followed closely by an entourage of uniformed men. By the elf’s reaction, Anders knew exactly who this might be.

 

Lanced through the heart by betrayal, he looked to his sister, who dared not meet his gaze. All she could weakly manage was, “I’m sorry it came to this, Leto.”

 

“You led him here,” he stepped back, a hand lifting to grasp the pommel of his sword. His panic was falling away, quickly replaced by the fury that had come to be all too familiar to Anders.

 

The mage drew his masked staff, readying himself for a fight.

 

“Now, now,” Danarius chided. “Don’t blame your sister. She did what any good Imperial citizen should.”

 

Fenris snarled, “I never wanted these filthy markings, Danarius, but I won’t let you kill me to get them.”

 

Varania looked away, wringing her hands. Danarius could only laugh at the outburst, “Oh, how little you know, my pet.” Looking to Anders, the Magister cooed patronizingly. “Now aren’t you going to introduce me to your little friend? I’m surprised at you, Fenris. I thought you’d developed a distaste for mages. Or does this one now hold your leash?”

 

Anders spat in disgust. “He isn’t your plaything, Magister. I’ll die before I see him a slave.”

 

“Do I detect a hint of jealousy? I sup-” Danarius was cut off as a bolt of lightning was thrown in his direction. One of the armored guards leapt in its path, absorbing the brunt of the shock, shuddering as his flesh burnt against armor. He fell, hitting the floor with a rough, heavy thud in front of the Magister.

 

“I’m sorry, did you have more to say?” Anders smirked.

 

Fenris did not wait for witty banter to continue. He leapt into action, lyrium bright as he ghosted from foe to foe like a wisp, felling guards with frightening precision. With his enhanced speed, none could keep up with how quickly he moved, the dance almost graceful.

 

Anders was not so graceful. He flung explosive spells toward Danarius, doing his best to disrupt his casting. When this succeeded, they began resorting to blood magic, calling forth demons from the Fade.

 

Anders felt enraged by this, as he was ever enraged by blood magic. They were the reason the templars brought hell upon them. Mages like this were why fear kept good, innocent people corralled into the Circles. Mages like this had scarred such hate into the elf’s heart that it could never be undone, and it was the latter that enraged him more than the others.

 

The battle was long and bloody, but the Magister’s entourage could not withstand their combined fury. When at long last Danarius fell to his knees, terrified and begging for his life, Fenris would show no mercy.

 

Seizing him by the throat, he lifted the Magister off the ground as though he were no more than a doll. “You are no longer my master,” he snarled. Hand squeezing closed, he crushed the neck of the mage, tearing out his throat in one swift, sickening pull, the rest of his body falling into a bloody, mangled heap of limbs.

 

He immediately turned to Varania, advancing on her, lost in a frenzy of rage and bloodlust.

 

“I had no choice, Leto,” she whimpered, backing away.

 

“Stop calling me that!” he growled, cornering her.

 

“He was going to make me his apprentice,” she tried to explain, as though it justified anything. “I would have been a Magister.”

 

Anders moved quickly, closing the distance between himself and them. He knew better than most the darkness the elf was capable of. Without intervention, he knew he would kill his sister. While she certainly might have deserved that for selling out her own family, the mage suspected he would later regret taking her life.

 

“Fenris…” Anders called out, pleading silently for him to calm down.

 

If the elf heard him, he did not respond to him. “You sold out your own brother to become a magister?” he spat, incredulous.

 

Varania grit her teeth, biting back tears. “You have no idea what we went through. What I’ve had to do since Mother died. This was my only chance.”

 

“Now you’ll have no chance at all,” he muttered darkly, veins of lyrium illuminating threateningly.

 

“Leto, please…” she wept, raising her hands futilely.

 

Anders set a hand on his shoulder, murmuring gently, “Fenris…”

 

The elf whirled around, sending an elbow across the mage’s face. There was a sickening crunch as Anders’ nose broke, blood streaking freely down his face. It had been a reflex reaction, though nothing about the look on his face suggested he felt apologetic for it. The mage stubbornly clung to his arm, holding him back with one hand, even as the other clutched at his face.

 

“Andraste’s flaming arse!” he swore, eyes watering as pain throbbed through his face. “Just...just don’t kill her, you great arse. Clear your head and hunt her down later if you’re still so damn upset.” He paused a moment to whimper, “Maker, my nose…” With a whine, he released the elf’s arm. “Do what you want, but you could at least recognize what life she might have had and feel some damn sympathy for a change.”

 

“Who asked you?” the elf snarled.

 

Anders leveled his gaze at the elf, holding his nose to stop the bleeding. With a bitter scowl, he turned away. “No one. And Maker, am I a fool for trying to help you. I think you can manage from here. Arse.”

 

Turning on his heel, he abandoned the pair to one another. Perhaps they deserved each other.

 

…

 

Fenris watched the mage leave, now turning back to his sister. She deserved to die for what she’d done. He watched her cower, and all he could see was the coalition of weakness in all magekind. In disgust, he looked away, seeking out the crumpled pile of Magister he’d so brutally slain.

 

“Get out,” he rasped, his voice suddenly hoarse.

 

Varania fled, eager to be away from him. It was at the door she would pause, turning to call back to him. “You said you didn’t ask for this, but that’s not true.You wanted it. You competed for it. When you won, you used the boon to have Mother and I freed.”

 

“Why are you telling me this!?” he cried, his fury cracking to reveal hints of the emotional turmoil beneath it.

 

Varania glared at him, suddenly defiant, braver at a distance. “Freedom was no boon. I look on you now and I think you received the better end of the bargain.”

  
With that, she left, leaving Fenris alone amidst the blood and carnage. 


	3. Never forgive, Never forget

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anders meddles in Fenris' business and receives little thanks. Fenris becomes lost after...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More comments = more chapters. Thank you to those who have commented so far. You fuel my writing fire!! (I'm a vain creature, you see. I need my ego fluffed, as it is very delicate.)

The week following the incident at the Hanged Man had mostly been a drunken blur. Fenris could not shake the feeling of being lost and alone, his only solace at the bottom of a bottle. Danarius was dead, he was unlikely to see his sister again, and what little scraps of friendship he gathered in his companions slipped through his fingers, as he did not know how to be a friend. Mostly because he did not know how to trust.

 

He kept thinking of the mage, inserting himself in his business, his face pouring blood from his broken nose. He’d felt nothing but rage, and in the process, he had once again driven the mage from him. It was entirely likely that he would have been overpowered without any assistance in the battle, and caught off guard to begin with.

 

He owed Anders his life. He almost hated him for that.

 

In a howl of rage, he shattered the bottle against the wall, the shards joining the remnants of broken glass from other rages, other times. Varric at one point suggested he take up mosaic art to use the pieces.

 

Sinking into his overlarge chair, he had not left his mansion since he had returned from the Hanged Man. Freedom was bitter and joyless, and he wondered why he strived so long to attain it. What did he have to live for now? To be at the beck and call of Kirkwall’s Champion? If not that, to take his rightful place among the free elves of the city’s alienage? Yes, he could picture it now. Free Fenris, dying in a dirty hovel surrounded by his own filth. That would show the Magisters.

 

He stood abruptly, swaying slightly unsteadily on his feet as intoxication spun circles in his head. He moved without thought,  taking up his sword and sheathing it at his back. He had to leave. Had to get out of the house whose walls pressed in all around him. He needed open air.

 

So he left. And he walked. He walked until he was sober once more, until hunger clawed at his belly, until he ached for sleep. And when he stopped walking, he realized he stood just outside the clinic of the mage. The lantern was out and he would likely be sleeping, as wee in the hours of the morning as it was.

 

For a moment, he sank back into old, comfortable hates. They cradled him, whispered at how he ought not be there, at how disgusting he was for seeking out a mage. They clawed at his spine, churned his innards, stoking the fires of his rage. _Why seek out another mage when you’ve just rid yourself of another?_ It cooed at the back of his mind. _The abomination consorts with demons. He is out of control._

 

Yet another feeling set iron in his core, digging its feet in to protest being dragged back to blind rage. The mage, while certainly an abomination and that could not be overlooked, had never once been so weak as to call on blood magic. Even when...when…

 

_“Is this some sort of vengeance for what you suffered at the hands of Danarius? I seem to be the face of everything horrible about Tevinter and magekind to you. Is that why it seems to feel so right to you to beat me? Abuse me? To tear me down? To hold me down and...use me as you see fit?”_

 

Even when he’d…

 

Fenris stared at the old, battered wood of the door. That the mage would come to his aid, defend him from the Magister, stop him from murdering his own sister in a fit of bloodlust and hate… While he was in no hurry to connect with the traitorous bitch, knowing that he had the option to, that it was a decision that could be made at any time, was oddly comforting in a way. The mage had given him more than he would have given himself: a choice.

 

No. The mage deserved an apology. He deserved to be thanked.

 

He tested the doorknob, finding it locked. Soreness framed his eyes as his weariness wore him down.

 

He wasn’t thinking clearly. He was tired, hungry, and sore in so many ways. Suddenly realizing how raw he felt, he turned to leave. Coming here had been a mistake.

 

The sound of the latch gave him pause and he turned back to look at the door just in time for it to open, Anders in the doorway bleary-eyed and half-awake, a dish of milk in his hands. His feather-pauldroned coat was unfastened, having been hastily pulled on over a thin, shabby, full-length tunic, clearly his sleepwear. Even his hair was undone, a cascade of shoulder-length spun gold. “Wh...Fenris?”

 

The elf stared at the mage with a strange intensity, his expression unfathomable. He was in turmoil, his emotions at war, each feeling fighting for the elf to speak something different. He said nothing.

 

Anders looked out and down the corridor, searching for others in the vicinity. He then blinked in sleepy confusion back at the elf, clearly disturbed by the fixation of his gaze. “Do you...need anything?”

 

Fenris scowled at his own stupidity. He was making a fool of himself. “No. I was just leaving.”

 

“You came all the way down to my clinic in Darktown to _‘just leave_ ’?” Anders yawned. “At...at this hour?”

 

The elf hesitated, his brows knitting together as an uncharacteristically sullen expression crossed his face.

 

Anders watched him for a moment, but quickly grew weary of standing in the doorway waiting for him to make up his mind. “Maker, I should set this milk out for you. You’re just like a cat, never knowing if you want in or out.” With an exasperated sigh, he set the milk dish down to the side. “Look, why don’t you come in for a cup of tea? You look like the wrong end of a Mabari.”  
  


“I…” Fenris began to protest, but shot him a look that seemed a bit like a plea. “...alright.”

 

He followed the mage into his clinic like a quiet shadow, sullen and silent as he lingered behind him. The other would lead him into the back into a small living space, pulling out a kettle and a pair of cups.

 

Fenris was lost in thought, mulling over the same feelings, ideas, and darkness that he had been for the past several weeks. It was the same pool of thoughts he’d been drowning in all night and morning, like wheels spinning tractionless in mud.

 

It was not long before a cup was set into his hands, drawing him from the darkest recess of his mind. “Thank you,” he nearly whispered, the response entirely absent-minded. He slowly sank onto the rickety chair in the corner beside the table.

 

The mage shot him a dubious look, clearly becoming concerned. “Not that I want to look a gift horse in the mouth, but you’re...friendlier than usual this morning.”

 

Fenris scowled, staring down into the colored water of his teacup.

 

“Maker, I shouldn’t have mentioned it. Sorry,” the mage mumbled, sitting on a crate beside his table serving as a makeshift chair.

 

“Anders,” he rasped.

 

The mage snapped his full attention to the elf now, startled to hear his name from the elf’s lips.

 

“I do not think well of mages. I do not like magic,” he spoke quietly in a low tone.

 

The mage set his teacup on the table, exasperated. “Look, if you came here at this hour to lecture-”

 

“But…” the elf continued, cutting him off. “I...have been...unkind to you. I had thought you nothing more than an abomination, yet I…” He scowled harder at his cup, as though the little porcelain object might suddenly spring out a well of blood magic. “I regret things I have done to you.”

 

Fenris was met with shocked silence as the mage took it all in, the bewilderment apparent on his face as he studied the elf’s face intently.

 

“I…” he trailed off, finally lifting the small cup to his lips to sip at the hot liquid. His eyelids were heavy, his weariness a likely culprit for his barefaced honestly as he spoke. It would have been smarter to return home, to sleep. Yet he was certain had he not come here now, he would have continued the silence between them.

 

Anders spoke at last, his throat feeling suddenly dry, likely partially in thanks to the tea. “You really have been a bit of a bastard,” he admitted.

 

Fenris shot him a glare, unappreciative of the confirmation. “I...know.”

 

Setting down his cup, Anders thumbed its rim, unsure of what to say. An uncomfortable silence settled over the room, until the mage set his hands over his face, pressing against it wearily. When his hands fell, he did not look to Fenris as he said, “I...don’t know if I can forgive you.”

 

“Perhaps you shouldn’t,” the elf scowled, heavy eyelids sliding closed. “I wouldn’t forgive it.”

 

He was so tired. He hadn’t slept in two days, and after sobering following a rather long bout of drinking, he could feel himself fading. He wanted to open his eyes, but they were so heavy...so heavy…

 

“Fenris.”

 

That opened his eyes. He gazed to the mage, who now stood over him, a hand outstretched, his expression more kind than the elf felt he deserved.

 

“I’ve got plenty of cots here. You look like you need to sleep,” Anders murmured.

 

Fenris looked to the outstretched hand, annoyed. “Why are you being kind to me?”

 

The offered hand immediately fell, the mage’s patience now being tested. “You are the most infuriating person I’ve ever met.”

 

“Then my question stands,” the elf scowled up at him.

 

Anders sighed, pressing his fingers to his temple, doing his best to soothe the headache the other was inflicting upon him. “You know, I don’t know. You’ve certainly never been thankful for it.”

 

“I apologize,” Fenris rose from his seat, the thing creaking ominously as he stood. “I have seemed ungrateful, and this is far from the truth. You have helped me in ways I...could not have asked for. If not for you, I might well be dead or a slave once more.” Melancholy stole away his irritable mood, leaving him sullen as he stood before the mage. “I suppose I have true freedom thanks to you.”

 

Anders shot him a dubious look. “And yet you don’t seem very happy about it. Did the help of a mage spoil it for you?”

 

Fenris donned his trademark scowl, softened by his weariness. “No, that isn’t it. I…I don’t think I know how to be free. It does not feel as it should…”

 

The mage appeared skeptical at the denial, but remained silent anyhow. There were opportunities for the elf to open up, and he was certainly not going to let one of them pass him by, especially seeing as how it was the first he could recall where he was concerned.

 

“I thought I might feel different,” he continued, unable to meet the mage’s eyes. “This freedom tastes like ashes. Varania was supposed to help me regain my past, perhaps by proxy even my future. I...do not know what is to become of me now. I have lived for little other purpose than to kill Danarius, and now it is done, and I do not have the family I had hoped to reconnect with. I have nothing.”

 

Fenris fell silent, wondering through the haze of his raw and sleep-deprived mind if he were becoming weak. After all that had happened, he was not certain why he was opening himself so to the mage, but he certainly knew he had no one else to speak to about it. Besides, the mage had been there when he’d met his sister, saved his life, and had witnessed him kill Danarius. These were private, personal things he already touched, and that touch infected the rest of his intimate thoughts like a virus. No wonder it made him feel ill.

 

A hand at his shoulder brought his attention to the mage. When their eyes met, he saw nothing but pity, his own weakness being mirrored back at him. His lip twitched as a scowl sought to deepen the creases of his face. He hated pity, and he resented the mage for flinging it so carelessly in his direction.

 

“Fenris...I…” Anders started, then shook his head. The mage lifted his other hand, settling it intimately over his cheek, fingertips brushing his earlobe.

 

Heat flooded the elf at the touch, dizzying him. Green eyes fell to the pouted, parted lips before him, his leggings becoming impossibly tight as he recalled how it had felt to take the mage’s mouth, and how exquisite the tightness of his throat had been.

 

Before his mind could wander further, Anders leaned forward, setting his mouth over Fenris’. His heart pounded, and before he could form a coherent thought, he drove himself forward, arms coiling around the mage’s waist and shoving him roughly backward until he collided with the wall with an ‘oof’. He devoured the hot tongue the mage offered to him, his own lapping up the remnants of tea, intoxicated by the taste of it mingled with the sweetness of the mage’s mouth.

 

The mage whimpered into his mouth, his own hungry and demanding. He broke the kiss to catch the elf’s lip roughly and briefly between his teeth, eliciting a low, rumbling growl. Fenris brought a clawed hand up to press a thumb to the mage’s chin, turning the other’s head to one side. Teeth raked over the flesh exposed there, the mage’s quickened pulse felt upon his lips.

 

“F-fenris,” he breathed, the name reverent on his tongue like a prayer.

 

The elf parted the mage’s legs with his knee, rolling his thigh between them to press firm against his groin. At this Anders shamelessly bucked his hips, grinding his wrought-iron rod against the other. Awkward, trembling hands flew to the clasps of the elf’s armor, struggling with the bindings.

 

“You’re rather eager, mage,” Fenris growled, nipping at his ear.

 

Anders lingered over one of the bindings, unable to remove the offending item. “I...I need…” he muttered incoherently,  his motions growing frantic. He dared not turn his neck away from the other’s teeth to look to it, even unable to undo the binding as he was.

 

The elf broke the kiss to seize the wrists of the trembling hands fussing at his armor, pinning them above the mage’s head. Anders writhed under his grasp, crying out as Fenris bit hard at the nape of his neck. He held onto the tender flesh for a moment, releasing his hold on it slowly, until a tongue trailed back up to his ear. “Tell me what you want,” he rasped in low baritone.

 

The mage visibly cringed in his grasp. “I…”

 

“Tell me, or I stop,” Fenris growled.

 

Anders whimpered as teeth sharply caught his earlobe, a flash of pain causing his hips to buck hard against the elf. Heat flushed his cheeks, moistened lips parted. “...I want...you. Please…” he begged.

 

The elf stepped back, tearing himself away from the mage, who whined at his sudden absence. Skilled, deft fingers swiftly undid the clasps of his armor, tossing the pieces carelessly aside. He leveled his gaze at the mage, weary yet energized by his own maddening lust. “You will have me,” he sneered.

 

He regarded the mage with amusement, smirking as the other watched him undress with an almost haunted hunger. Anders leaned heavily back against the wall, eyes half-lidded, chest heaving as he struggled to catch his breath. He gripped himself so tightly through the thin fabric of his tunic his knuckles were white, wincing at the harshness of his own touch.

 

Fenris took note of this as he bared himself, olive flesh unfolding before the other’s eyes, revealing lines of lyrium and myriad scars over a frame that, while lean, had a bulk of muscle a measure more than was typically seen on an elf. It was dichotomous, the slender, almost graceful frame beneath the sturdy build of a seasoned warrior.

 

When he wore nothing more than leggings and footwraps, he collided with the mage once more. Lips met with prying urgency, each as hungry to devour the other. The bared hands of the elf sank into the collar of the mage’s coat, jerking it roughly backwards to discard the thing. Anders shrugged out of it, hands quick to thereafter smooth over the hardened, hairless muscle of the elf’s chest.  His hands continued to roam, memorizing every rippling sinew laid before him, desperate to touch every part of him.

 

The mage would then break the kiss, sinking to his knees to unlace the elf’s leggings. Fenris purred a note of approval, aching with the anticipation of his mouth. That he was about to freely give what he had previously taken by force...it sent desire pulsing into his length, and it was all he could do to not seize the mage by his hair and drive himself in.

 

Anders freed him more easily this time, leaving the laces intact. He jerked the things down, causing the elf’s impressive length to bounce free of its bindings, nestled as it was on a bed of thin, fur-like, soft dark hair. Like a man starved he drew the shaft immediately into his mouth, Fenris fisting his hand in the mage’s hair with a snarl.

 

The elf did his best to not force himself in, to let the mage take things at his own pace. He was surrounded by heat and wet, and soft, slithering suction. In fact, he took the elf in so hard, at such quickened pace, and so deeply that he was doing a fine job of face-fucking himself on the elf’s cock.

 

The head of him dipped into the mage’s throat, the force of constriction there almost more than he could bear. Without realizing it, he set a firm grip on the mage’s head, and had begun to drive himself into the sucking pressure past his tongue, the mage whimpering between thrusts as he pinched cruelly at his own length through the fabric.

 

A hand at his hips settled his thrusting, making him aware that he had been moving. When the mage sighed in what nearly sounded like disappointment, Fenris yanked him back by his hair, cock slipping free of his mouth with a loud ‘pop’.

 

Fenris drew him back up to his feet, turning them both and driving them back across the room. He released the mage just shy of the cot in the corner, pulling the tunic up and over his head.

 

Anders was entirely nude before him now, exquisitely pale and with sparse groupings of freckles. He had the lean figure of malnourishment on a frame that might have otherwise been sturdy, living in shadows as he had been. His cock stood painfully erect between them, twitching with need and anticipation. Fenris hesitated for a moment to admire the mage, his purr of approval setting a flush of embarrassment to the other’s cheeks.

 

Fenris pushed the mage onto the foot of the cot, crawling over him, forcing him to scoot back until Anders lie on his back, legs around the other’s hips. The elf took the turgid length of the mage in hand, a thumb trailing from its base up to the tip, gathering the dew from its tip. He met the mage’s gaze as he lifted this hand to his own mouth, drawing his thumb over his tongue to sample the flavor.

 

Anders groaned at the sight, knees falling farther apart, thighs drawing upward as he wantonly exposed himself to Fenris, rocking his rear end against the elf. Fenris hummed low, weary eyes closing as he concentrated, making himself fully present in the sensation of the mage grinding himself on his aching cock.

 

“Is that what you wish of me, mage?” he growled, leaning forward sharply, pressing Anders’ thighs to his own chest. “Is this what you need so badly?” His shaft slid hard against the mage’s crevice, grating smoothly against his puckered hole.

 

Anders did not meet the intensity of his gaze. Moisture collected in his eyes as he looked away in shame, his voice barely audible. “Yes…” he breathed.

 

Fenris slid a hand up over his belly, deft fingers seeking out a taut nipple to pinch it cruelly. Anders cried out, hips bucking, grinding himself once more over the elf’s rigid member. Another hand dipped into the open mouth of the mage as it gaped open, moistening his fingers. Slick with the mage’s saliva, they slid down to his pucker, pressing inward and sliding inside more easily than the elf anticipated. With a purr, Fenris sneered down at him. “Speak clearly, mage. I did not hear you.”

 

“Yes, I need it!” he hissed between clenched teeth, trembling below the elf. “Use me. Use me, choke me, fuck me!” He pleaded like a forbidden chant, hands clutching at the bedding beneath him.

 

Fenris let slip a laugh, rich, dark, and cruel. Fingers tugged on the mage’s marionette strings from within, playing his body like an instrument. It made the mage sing, writhing as he was over the elf’s touch. His pleas continued, mumbled and nearly incoherent, hips rocking over his fingers, seeking more from them, wanting them deeper.

 

“Please…” he practically wept, a lust-drunk and half-lidded gaze leveled at him.

 

When their eyes met, Fenris growled, removing his fingers and replacing them with his cock. He pressed in slowly, hands gripping tightly at the mage’s hips. Heat bathed over his length, easing into Anders with far less resistance than before.

 

The mage coiled his legs around the elf’s hips, drawing him forward, rocking his ass hard against Fenris until he was fully sunk in. Fenris gasped between clenched teeth at this, dark eyes predatory now upon the mage.

 

Pulling himself out slowly, he drove himself back in hard and fast, hips slapping against his backside. Anders’ back arched, crying out in pleasure, knuckles whitened by the fisting of his bedsheets. Pleased by this, Fenris immediately set to a frantic pace, growling as he fucked the mage senseless.

 

The mage took himself in both hands, pumping at his own length furiously. Fenris licked at his lips hungrily as he watched Anders desperately seek out more pleasure, his pace quickening further still. Green eyes traveled upward to the mage’s bare throat, long and exposed.

 

Choke me he’d said.

 

With one hand steadying the vigorous pistoning into the mage’s cavity, the elf set his other hand against Anders’ throat, thumb and index finger pressing hard beneath jawline. He was careful to choke the flows of blood, leaving the mage’s windpipe free to produce the exquisite whimpering he so enjoyed.

 

As though he’d pressed a switch, Anders lost himself to the sensation. His careful grasp on his magic slipped as he reached the height of his passion, energy seeping into Fenris from each place flesh met flesh. Veins of lyrium caught alight, his entire body humming and pulsing in tune with the mage’s heartbeat.

 

It was unimaginable ecstasy, and Fenris did not withstand it long. He drove himself within the mage one last time before crying out, energy pulsing through him and pressing at the other side of his release, filling the other with an ocean of fluid, nectar seeping out around him.

 

When the pair collapsed, he was breathless atop the mage, his marking throbbing with a dull ache. He was tense at the pain, weary enough from spending himself and from lack of sleep that he could not muster his usual rage.

 

Anders sensed his tension, still breathless himself as he whispered, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to...are you alright?”

 

Fenris groaned, extricating himself from the mage with a shudder, a hand at his temple. “Don’t,” he spat, irritated by the mage’s pity.

 

When he sat back, Anders searched his pained expression, his own brows furrowing in worry. “It hurts, doesn’t it?”

 

“If you had any shred of control, it might not,” he snarled, shrinking back like an injured animal.

 

Anders sat up, leaning forward to touch a hand to the elf’s cheek, a gentle glow flashing there momentarily. Relief flooded through Fenris, the pain suddenly gone. Another hollow echo of pleasure made him shudder, this one more alarming and unwelcome.

 

Despite the alleviation, he swatted the mage’s hand away. “I do not appreciate these manipulations!” he rebuked. “You…” He trailed off, lacking the energy to fuel his anger. “...you do not know how I have been tortured with these.” The face of Danarius assaulted his mind, memories of magic pulsing through him, pleasure and pain mingling, how he had begged…

 

The mage coiled his arms around Fenris, pulling him into a fierce embrace. “Maker forgive me, I didn’t know.” The mage clung to him tightly, the seed he’d spilled across his own belly smearing between them. “Never again. Never without your permission,” he whispered a solemn vow.

 

Fenris’ hands fisted at his sides, the urge to pull the mage away from him by his hair palpable for the briefest of moments. With a weary sigh, he let it fade, inside resting his head on the mage’s shoulder, his eyelids heavier than before. “Shut up, mage,” he said nigh affectionately.

 

He could feel himself growing heavy, the comforting sounds of the mage’s breathing growing increasingly distant. He was vaguely aware of his name being whispered into his ear, then of a sinking sensation as he finally found a darkness that felt warm and comfortable.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm also thinking about doing a fanart contest for any of you who have such talents. I'd like it to be based on the DA fanfics I have written! Winner gets to pick my next DA fanfic storyline. Would any of you be interested?


	4. Inner Demons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anders finally sees his plan through.

Anders awoke some time later, surprised to not only find Fenris still present, but clinging to him like a lost child. He held the elf protectively in his arms, attempting to sort through what had happened earlier that morning.

 

He knew not what any of it meant. He was not certain if he and the elf were friends, let alone lovers. What he did know is that the slow-trusting elf had confided in him, and he had been allowed to see a vulnerability that no other likely had.

 

Unless perhaps Isabella had.

 

He soured at the thought, a scowl turning the corners of his mouth downward. What did the pirate bitch know, anyhow? Where was she when Fenris needed help facing Danarius? It had been him, not her!

 

_This jealousy is unbecoming. You know what must be done_ , a voice echoed in his head, dominating his thoughts.

 

He knew, he knew. There was a task to perform. One that would solidify Fenris’ hate for him for good, he was certain. It would be time soon, and he could not afford to be dissuaded from his task by someone who could not understand its purpose. Besides, he was uncertain where this sudden affection for the former slave had come from.

 

Just because he had opened up to him a little didn’t mean he held any real fondness for the man. Certainly, he seemed to be confused about his feelings, but how did the mage know it was not lust conflicting with hate? And for that matter, how did he know if he did not feel that for the elf? Oh, he had fantasized about his touch, dreaming of the hand at his throat, the long cock in…

 

_No. It didn’t matter._

 

Yet he found his arms around the former slave, holding him close, face buried in his snowy white hair. It felt so right to hold him, to want to protect him from the hurts of his past, from the Magister that sought to reclaim him, from his own sister. Whether it made sense to him or not, he did genuinely care for the elf. It had become clear when he’d been unable to abandon him to Danarius.

 

_It does not matter. He will not stand with mages. He is not for our cause. It cannot be._

 

Anders felt moisture gathering at his eyes. He wondered if it was really so wrong to have this before the end. It wasn’t perfect, and it wasn’t caring or gentle, but it was a little less lonely.

 

Fenris began tossing and turning in his sleep, twitching as unknown horrors hounded his dreams. Anders pressed a kiss to his forehead, hating himself for caring so much. It made no sense to him that he should have such feelings for someone who should be an enemy. It did not help that he knew the elf felt the same.

 

He began to carefully extricate himself from him, Justice urging him to set to work on his manifesto. Perhaps one day the elf would read it and be swayed. If no one else could be swayed by his writings in defense of magekind, he hoped at least Fenris would. His heart would sing in triumph if even this one elf could believe.

 

It was Fenris who would stop him, waking suddenly to bolt upright, gasping into the darkness.

 

Anders had bolted upright from nightmares so many times that he knew immediately what the elf needed to hear. “You’re still in my clinic.”

 

The elf was tense, rigid in the mage’s arms. Slowly he would ease, heaving a sigh as he sank back into the cot. “...I see.”

 

The mage leaned backwards and away from him, reaching over to an old crate beside the bed to pluck a glass of water from there. “Here. Drink.”

 

Fenris sat up, taking the glass and draining it greedily. It was then passed back to Anders, who set it back onto the crate. Afterwards for a time the elf was silent, sitting and hunched forward, his face in his hands. When he finally broke the silence his voice was hoarse and rasping, “I..should not disturb you any longer.”

 

As he rose and began seeking out his clothing, Anders slid from the cot to light a lantern. “Regretting it already?” he asked, more bitter than he cared to sound.

 

Fenris hesitated, glaring at the wall, not meeting his gaze. “No. It was...this was…” he trailed off, at a loss for words. “I’ve never felt anything like this. I cannot tell whether or not I am being a fool.”

 

Anders felt moved by his admission. The elf was changing. The less malice he displayed, the harder it became to reason with himself that he should not carry on with him so. Still, he could not release the sudden bitterness plaguing him, even as he ached to lie back down and take Fenris in his arms once more. “Maker knows how foolish it is to be with a _mage_ ,” he muttered, voice dripping with venom. He regretted the jab as he said it.

 

The elf whirled on him, clearly agitated by the comment. “How right you are,” he spat. “And here you have helped me see that I was most assuredly being a fool.” Fenris began fastening his armor in place in quick, erratic motions, annoyance bubbling quickly into anger.

 

“Blame yourself,” Anders hissed, his words scarcely feeling like his own. “You’re the one who came crawling down here to me.” Maker, why could he not stop?

 

No, it was better this way. When he carried through with his plan, the elf would hate him. Better to end it now and save them both further heartache. Let him die with Fenris hating him.

 

Fenris continued to latch his armor into place, not looking to the mage. “I had thought...well. It doesn’t matter now. I see what has happened. As revenge, you have used me, and now you discard me. I hope it has comforted you, _mage_.” He said the last with pure spite. He quickly finished dressing himself, re-settling his sword at his back.

 

“Well, then maybe Isabella can comfort _you_ ,” he scowled.

 

“Festis bei umo canavarum!’ the elf spat, his fists clenching tightly at his sides. “I have _never_...no. I am done. I cannot do this.” Disgusted, he turned and stormed out the door of the clinic, slamming it sharply on his way out.

 

The mage froze, his own heart breaking by his own hand. Fenris had finally opened up, and now he was being cast aside. He would feel alone once more. Perhaps more so now. He’d done nothing but rub salt in his wounds. Yet he could say nothing, and he knew then that it was Justice who spoke, his own voice drowned out as his inner companion drove out the distraction that interfered with his work.

 

…

 

Anders sat on a crate, head bowed as he wrung his hands. He remembered that last conversation with Fenris as though it had been yesterday. It was all he could think of as he waited for Hawke’s decision.

 

When First enchanter Orsino and Knight-Commander Meredith once again clawed at one another’s throats in the streets, they had quarreled like children, needing their mother, Grand Cleric Elthina, to come and set them right again. It had happened time and time again, each time the pair settling back into the status quo, more tense than they’d been before. Each time it happened the Knight Commander cracked down harder, finding ghosts in every shadow. Each time she did so, more mages turned to blood magic out of desperation. It was a cycle that needed to end before it ended in the death of all mages.

 

He had planned for weeks, gathering carefully the precise ingredients he would need to carry out what must be done. He knew that with Elthina present, they would ever be pressed back into their historical roles, each respected the final word of the chantry as law. The Grand Cleric was a good woman with good intentions, unaware of the damage she allowed to run rampant. Or perhaps she was aware, and was not the saintly figure she was painted. Either way, it did not matter. She needed to be removed.

 

He could still hear the screams of innocents as eerie red light illuminated the chantry, demolishing it completely. A well placed strike of power. A chain reaction of explosives…

 

And now he deserved to die. He knew it, and so did Hawke if she would just get on with admitting it. She lingered behind him, staring at his back as though there were some question of what needed to be done.

 

Anders could die well by her hand knowing that she would at least be protecting the circle mages.

 

“There’s nothing you can say that I haven’t already said to myself,” he spoke, not turning to look to his companion. He could not bear to meet that disapproving gaze, see the hate and fear there. “I took a spirit into my soul and changed myself forever to achieve this. This is the justice that all mages have awaited.”

 

“Do you have any idea how fanatic that sounds? Maker, Anders,” Hawke grimaced, a hand over her face. “You know I can’t...that I have to…” She looked over her shoulder to her companions for support.

 

“Belief is no excuse. Sincerity does not justify...this,” Aveline stood firm with Hawke.

 

Varric sighed in exasperation. “I think I’m sick of mages and templars.”

 

Anders was painfully aware of the silent Fenris behind him. He could picture his face, seething with rage and hate. Despite all better judgment, despite the outrage of Justice, he cared deeply for the elf. Though it may have been better that he die hated, it tore at him to think Fenris would despise him for all time, that he would become another mark of a foul mage on his past, just like his former Master.

 

He dipped a hand into his coat, thumb smoothing over the old, thin fabric of a pillow he kept from his mother, a lifetime ago before he’d lost his home. Before he’d been set in a mage’s prison. He thought of Ser Pounce-A-Lot, brave and noble cat, and how it was good he had a home.

 

“Hawke, it’s alright. I knew what this would mean. I’m...I’m ready,” he smiled joylessly, still unable to turn and face his friends. If they even wished to be called that anymore.

 

There was a dreadful silence, until the padding of bare feet on stone caught his ear, a flurry of activity behind him.

 

“What the hell are you doing?” Hawke shouted.

 

Anders spun about now, seeking where his killing blow had gone. Fenris stood in its path, tall and stern, refusing to move away. A hand rested at the hilt of his sword, ready to act. The mage stared up at his back, now blocking his view of the others. His mouth hung agape in disbelief.

 

“Venhedis. I can’t,” the elf growled.

 

“Fenris, you may have missed this, but Blondie’s a mage,” Varric informed unhelpfully.

 

“He has to pay for what he’s done!” Hawke stood her ground, dagger in her hand still.

 

Anders stood, his heart pounding. He didn’t understand. Fenris was supposed to hate him. Why was he defending him now? Especially after what he’d said. “Fenris...it’s alright. I need to atone.”

 

Fenris glanced over his shoulder. “I’ll deal with you in a moment, mage.” Looking back to the others, the elf warned in a low, dangerous tone, “I will not see him dead. Mark my words, he shall not harm another soul either.”

 

“This isn’t your choice,” Aveline set a hand on her sword, readying to fight. “Stand aside, Fenris.”

 

“No,” he scowled. “There is a city who needs your help, Hawke. Do you really want to waste time fighting here when more of your precious mages die by the minute? Each moment you delay, the templars slay more.”

 

Hawke was flustered, speechless for a moment. Eventually she sheathed her dagger, face contorted in fury. “Blight _take_ you, elf!” she spat. “Very well. Don’t let me see either of you again.”

 

“No!” Anders protested as the party turned and began to leave. “Fenris, don’t do this. They’re your friends. Don’t...not for…”

 

Fenris turned, lyrium aflame, clawed hand seizing his collar in unbridled fury. “ _Fasta vass!_ What were you thinking, abomination?”

 

The mage did not defend himself. Perhaps the elf sought to kill him himself. Perhaps that was poetic, in a sad, sickening way. Utterly defeated, resigned to death, he looked to the elf wearily. “It was the only way. I...I’m sorry.”

 

“The only way? There were innocent people in there. Mages! Would you tell them it was the only way?” he snarled.

 

“I would,” he replied sadly. “They’re why I must pay. They must have their justice as well.”

 

The elf reached back. Anders knew the blow was coming, but did nothing to stop the hardened metal at the back of Fenris’ hand to draw sharply across his face. It split open his lip, blood seeping from the wound. “Festis bei umo canavarum!”

 

“Yes, you’ve said that. I’m sure it means something quite colorful,” the mage touched his lip gingerly, wincing at his own touch. “Now do the right thing, before you damn yourself with me.”

 

“Believe me, I am tempted,” he spat.

 

A noise from the side drew his attention. While it turned out to be nothing, the cries of battles and clashes of steel and burning sulphur permeated the air. It was dangerous to remain where they were. He looked back to Fenris, becoming frantic. “Fenris, please. They’ll all be trying to kill me now.”

 

The elf turned, dragging the mage along with him by the collar. “I will not allow it.”

 

Digging in his heels, he struggled in the other’s grasp, desperately trying to free himself for Fenris’ sake. “Why are you doing this!?”

 

“Shut up, mage!” he hissed. “We can argue about this when we find safe passage out of here.”

 

“I can help you with that,” a smooth, sultry voice came from behind.

 

Fenris whirled about, hand remaining on Anders to ensure he did not flee. “Isabella?”

 

“See, I’ve been thinking that it’s about time for me to leave Kirkwall, seeing as everything has rather gone to shit,” the buxom pirate mused. “It’s good luck for you that I happened by.”

 

“Oh, lovely. Yes, let’s let your tart save us,” Anders pouted, arms crossing over his chest.

 

“Fasta vass! _Shut up, mage!”_ Fenris snarled. “Isabella, I would be grateful if you would allow us passage on your ship.”

 

“Grateful indeed,” Anders huffed.

 

Isabella giggled, beckoning the pair to follow along. “Come on, then. That is, if your sweetie isn’t going to fuss the whole way.”

 

“Maker give me strength should he try,” Fenris muttered.

 

…

 

Fenris watched the red glow over Kirkwall from a distance as they sailed away. The fires burning the city looked like soft, flickering lanterns from so far.

 

“I’m sorry, Hawke,” he murmured over the loud crashing of the waves, into the inky black of the night.

 

Turning, he moved below deck, seeking to join the mage in the hold. He would find him tucked between barrels, knees drawn up to his chest. Anders would look up at him as he approached, face aglow with warmth in the light of the lantern beside him. To his chest was clutched a stack of papers.

 

Fenris sat beside him, feeling exhausted. “Mage.”

 

Anders looked down, studying the grain of the wood on the floor. “Fenris,” he returned, his expression darkening. “Have a nice chat with the fearless captain?”

 

“You will stop this!” he growled. “Isabella has done nothing to you, and you spit venom at her at every turn like a viper. Be thankful she was willing to save your life.”

 

“I did not ask for it to be saved,” he replied stubbornly. “And I know you two...you...well. Whatever. It isn’t my business.”

 

Fenris groaned. “This again. I have no idea what put this nonsense in your head. I have never slept with Isabella.”

 

Anders looked stunned. “You...haven’t? But Isabella said…”

 

The elf set a hand to his temple, rubbing circles into it. “Of _course_ she did…” Sighing, weary of the petty jealousy, he leaned back against a barrel, setting his sheathed blade aside.

 

“Oh,” the mage winced. “Well. I...have really been stupid.”

 

“On that we can agree,” Fenris huffed.

 

A silence settled between them as the ship rocked over the waves, cradling the pair in its pregnant belly. The mage worried at his lip a long while, mulling over whatever thoughts he carried like burdens. Fenris watched him, wondering what he might say, how he might explain his actions.

 

“Fenris, why did you do it?” the mage asked, his eyes pleading. “Why did you...save me?”

 

“Partially because I owed you,” he started, mulling over those very questions himself. “And...because I could not watch you die. I ridicule you for weakness, yet there is mine. It is...uncomfortable to be a hypocrite.”

 

“It would have been better if you hated me,” he whispered.

 

Fenris glared at Anders, drawing up a knee to rest his elbow on it. “Believe me, I tried. You are...a mage. An abomination. Now, a murderer. I cannot fathom why I care for you. Perhaps I am hopelessly spoiled by magic, this...absconding another symptom of its infection. It does not matter now. By now we’re both enemies of half of Thedas. There is no turning back.”

 

“I didn’t want this for you,” he muttered, thumbing the corner of his stack of papers, lost in his melancholy.

  
“Yet I am at your side,” the elf replied in a surprisingly gentle tone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Had another thought. What if I wrote a choose-your-own-adventure fanfic where you all voted on what happened next in the comments? That sounds rather fun.


	5. The Emerald Beetle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anders and Fenris are on a boat.

Fenris sat in the crow’s nest, keeping watch over the impossible stretches of inky black in all directions. Visibility was poor due to low clouds and mists of rain, making the task a miserable one.

 

Despite the oiled, wooden overhang above him, the mist, light and dancing, whirled around it, blowing in from the sides with the breeze. It soaked him through to the bone, a telltale shiver crawling up his spine more often than he cared for. The incessant rocking of the ship, combined with the occasional shiver made him ache, dull and throbbing, pulsing along the veins of lyrium.

 

They had been traveling for weeks, having stopped twice for supplies for the span of several days. Each time both Anders and Fenris remained on the ship, finding the idea of traipsing about in general public unwise. They did not know if they were being pursued, let along how fiercely they might have been. Neither wanted to find out by getting caught.

 

The weeks they traveled were spent in relative silence, increasingly awkward as time wore on. It was clear the mage found it too painful to speak, where the elf had little comfort to offer that his presence could not provide. That, and Fenris had his own feelings to sort out regarding their grand escape.

 

He knew it was largely a result of Anders’ meddling in regard to Danarius. Had the mage ignored it, and had Fenris somehow managed to survive the encounter, he was certain he would have allowed Hawke to kill the mage. The abomination had blown up the chantry, and it was the fate he deserved.

 

Yet the mage _had_ meddled, and to a degree of success that Fenris found baffling. He still felt a touch of guilt over breaking his nose in thanks. It was then that intense attraction had turned more toward genuine caring. He’d been disgusted by it at first, but as time wore on it became...easier.

 

What did not become easier was watching the mage battle with depression, most days sulking over his precious manifesto when he wasn’t sleeping through day and night. While he seemed to be more accustomed to Fenris’ presence than ever before, it was more with the indifference one might feel for a table across the room as opposed to companionship. There were even times when the elf wondered if the other were a danger to himself.

 

It was strange to see him so withered and spineless following the most bold move toward Circle abolition that had ever been seen. He had been willing to kill and die for the cause, and Fenris supposed he’d even partially succeeded. He certainly wasn’t living. It made it difficult not to brand him a weak, whimpering coward, to not fall back into old hates.

 

Hate was like an ugly knot that he could not unwork from his soul. It was...uncomfortable how familiar it felt, at how easy it came. Yet even with it weighing heavy in him, he found its voice to be softening, growing a little more quiet over time as something else took its place.

 

After drifting hopelessly for weeks, lost in darkness, he found purpose as the mage’s guardian. His entire life he had been something to be used, a tool. Even in ‘freedom’ he could not escape what he’d been molded into, and the idea of having no purpose, of being useless, was a frightening one.

 

In a way it made him seethe and fester that he should be like something crippled, needing purpose like a buoy to keep him adrift in a storm. It was a broken edge he wielded to carve out his place in the world, as bloody in his hands as it was against anyone he applied it to.

 

To think that what was given to him by mages should be used to save and protect a mage…

 

Scowling, he heard the sounds of shuffling below him. Rising to his feet, a hand gripping firmly at the ring bolted to the pole for support, he faced the wind and rain. His relief was there. His turn at watch was over.

 

The other fellow grunted his greeting as he climbed into the crow’s nest. Fenris said nothing as he waited for the other to move out of his way, thereafter climbing down to the desk below. His belly lurched, the waves rocking his hunger into nigh illness.

 

He was driven to the levels below deck, seeking out the ship’s stores to rummage for something to eat. Finding hardtack biscuits and a bit of dried meat from their recent stop at a port, he tucked the morsels into a cloth.

 

When he arrived back at the tiny cabin they shared, he found the mage awake by lantern’s light, staring vacantly up at the underside of the bunk above him as he lay in his own. He glanced in the elf’s direction, but could not look directly at him. He remained silent.

 

“Come eat,” Fenris commanded, sitting at the edge of the bed the mage lie on.

 

Anders did not move. “...not hungry.”

 

“You haven’t eaten in three days. I will use force if necessary, mage,” he spoke forcefully, but not angrily. He held out a bit of jerky and a biscuit to the other.

 

With a weary sigh, the mage rolled forward, dragging himself into a seated position behind the elf. He took the biscuit in one hand, meat in the other, staring at them as though they were foreign things he could not fathom. After a long pause, he bit into the biscuit with a sour expression on his face.

 

Then, for the first time in what felt like eternity, he made conversation.

 

“Where are you taking me?” Anders ask, barely invested in his own query.

 

“Rivain. To Dairsmuid,” the elf replied between devouring his own scraps.

 

Anders nibbled at his biscuit absent-mindedly, appearing, for a change, present enough to think about what had been said to him. “Oh,” was all he managed finally.

 

Fenris finished his paltry meal in the gap of the following silence, breaking it himself when he was finished. “I grow weary of this, mage.”

 

“Then go,” Anders bristled in annoyance.

 

“You will eventually have us both killed if you continue to carry on as though you are already dead,” the elf pressed on, voice low and controlled.

 

“I have no future, so I may as well be,” he looked at the half-eaten biscuit in his hand. “I gave that up when I...did what I did.”

 

Fenris climbed onto the top bunk, lying down gingerly to mind his throbbing lyrium veins. He ignored the dampness that soaked through to his bones, instead focusing on the infuriating mage below him. Maintaining control of his temper was difficult in the face of the mage’s depression.

 

“They...hurt, don’t they,” he heard the mage comment beneath him.

 

“I am accustomed to the pain,” he dismissed.

 

“I wish you’d let me help with them,” he muttered.

 

Fenris heaved a sigh, staring up at the low ceiling of the cabin. After another long pause, he glanced to the side. “Mage. I propose a bargain.”

 

Silence. Fenris continued anyhow.

 

“I will allow you to touch me with your magic if you fight for your future.”

 

The silence was palpable. If it were not for the mage’s breathing, telltale of his wakeful state, he might have thought the mage wandered the Fade. After some time, there came a creaking as the mage shifted in his bed.

 

“...but you hate being touched. Especially by magic.”

 

“I despise this moping more so. Do you accept or not?” Fenris growled.

 

“I…” Anders swallowed hard. “I’ll try.”

 

“Good,” the elf murmured, his eyes closing.

 

The sound of shuffling followed by a weight settling in next to him opened his eyes again. Anders crawled alongside him, the ceiling not quite high enough to sit upright on the top bunk. Fenris felt apprehensive of his approach, shying from contact as much as the small bed allowed. He was cold and he ached, and the touch of another would only worsen it.

 

When the mage outstretched a glowing hand, he visibly tensed. Anders hesitated at his tension, eyes searching his. Fenris gave him a single, solemn nod.

 

A warm hand laid over the elf’s armored chest, the blue glow seeping in through the armor. It illuminated the lyrium, pain slowly numbing until all he felt was a pleasant hum. It echoed in the dark chambers of his mind, the elf’s hand reflexively grasping the mage’s wrist as visions from his past loomed to haunt.

 

Anders, encouraged that he was not pushed away despite his wrist locked in an iron grip, finished his spell. When the glow faded, Fenris could feel nothing. Wonderful, soothing nothing. His grip on the mage eased, his tension melting away, sleep tugging at his eyelids.

 

“You shouldn’t go to bed with wet clothes on,” Anders frowned at the sleepy elf.

 

“I feel more comfortable sleeping in my armor,” Fenris muttered, unwilling to debate.

 

“You’ll catch cold.”

 

Fenris scowled at the man beside him, annoyed by this sudden mother-henning. “Go to bed, mage.”

 

Anders furrowed his brows. In the dim light of the lantern he looked a mess. It was clear he hadn’t been sleeping, and weeks of skipping meals were making him more angular and boney than looked healthy. The bags under his eyes made them appear bruised, matted hair pressed flat over his forehead. “Would you...allow me to sleep here? With you?”

 

The elf shot him an unamused glare. Despite his displeased and disapproving gaze, he outstretched an arm. “Lie here, then, if you must. Be warned that I will push you onto the floor if you toss and turn as you normally do.”

 

“That’s fair,” he whispered, reaching over the bed to turn the lantern low. He then laid himself on his side, head in the nook of the elf’s arm, a hand resting on his chest. “Is this alright?”

 

“ _Fasta vass_ ,” Fenris groaned. “It will not be if you keep talking.”

 

The elf knew he was cold, that his armor would press hard against the mage’s cheek, that the dampness would soak into the other as well. Selfishly, he admitted to himself that he wanted the mage there anyhow. After weeks of cold distance and icy silence, it was comforting to have him express a desire for closeness.

 

Without the burn of the lyrium to stir him awake, sleep came to claim Fenris quickly. For the first time in as long as he could remember, he would sleep deep enough to dream.

 

…

 

_“Leto!” a little girl tugged at his shirt, large green eyes wide and staring._

_“I’ve got it,” he huffed, one hand raised high above his head as he held a large bug up to the window._

_“He’s not going!! Leto, hurry!” the little girl whined, fidgeting with worry. “Mistress will skoosh him if he doesn’t fly away!”_

_The elven boy shook his hand, annoyed at the little shelled creature on his hand, a deep emerald that glinted in the light. “Come on, you stupid beetle…”_

_“Da’len, what are you doing?” a voice came behind them._

_He turned to look at the beautiful elven woman who’d entered the room, auburn hair specked with silver, pulled back into a coil of braids. She had a soft, kind face, smiling gently as she was at him._

_“Mama, the bug!” the girl squealed, little pigtails of the same brilliant auburn bouncing as she hopped._

_“We’re trying to save him, but he won’t fly away!” he explained, growing more anxious as the stubborn thing sat longer._

_“You hold him so gently, Leto, my love,” she laughed, tenderly scooping the brilliant green insect from his palm. “You must drop him so he will fly. Watch.”_

_Reaching out the window, she spread her hands slowly apart, the beetle agitated by his loss of perch. With a heavy buzz, it fluttered its wings and took off, barreling clumsily out the window. “Ar lasa mala revas.”_

_The little elven girl laughed brightly. “Dareth shiral, little bug!” she called after it._

_“Stop shouting, Varania,” Leto chided, even as his heart soared watching the beetle fly away._

_The woman stooped forward to hug the lad from behind, her soft cheek pressing against his. There was the sweet scent of summer in her embrace, spice in the wind. “Oh, my Leto!” she laughed, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Now take care of your sister. I must return to work.”_

_When she pulled away, she took Varania into her arms, pressing a kiss to her forehead as well. “And my sweet girl! Listen to your brother.”_

 

....

 

Fenris awoke, eyes wide as he clung to the scrap of memory that had returned to him. Parts of it slipped away quickly, and he lost what the woman had looked like. The loss of her image made his heart ache, a shuddering breath drawn in sharply.

 

He became increasingly aware of the weight beside him, of the warmth curled around him, and of the arm draped across his stomach. He lifted the arm that was not pinned down by mage, a hand rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Looking down, he could barely make out the golden hair in the darkness, instead concentrating on the heavy sound of Anders’ breathing.

 

He did not know how long they had slept. Judging by how weighted and sluggish he felt, he guessed it had been quite some time. Sleep, as it turned out, had come much easier without lyrium-induced pain to hound him awake.

 

The arm the mage lay his head upon bent at the elbow, the long, clawed fingers of his hand resting at the back of the other’s head, thumb stroking idly through his hair. He turned the dream over in his mind, holding onto as much of it as he could.

 

A sudden gratitude welled in his belly for the mage. The memory would have been more painful had Anders not saved Varania from him.

 

Varania. Fenris sighed.

  
Mages would be the death of him.


	6. Dairsmuid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anders keeps his end of the bargain. Isabella gets them to Dairsmuid.

Anders woke to an empty bed, disoriented from how hard he’d slept. He could not even recall his dreams, if he had any, nor of a moment spent in the Fade.

 

While he’d spent a great deal of time in bed, it had not been to sleep. It had been to lie in misery, thinking on how he had betrayed his friends, on the people he had killed, on the silent, noticeably absent Justice, on the elf and the grand escape he’d be drug along with. It all had left no time for sleeping, thus he had been impossibly weary.

 

The morning looked rather different after actual rest, and for the first time in ages, he could hear his stomach growling, turning with hunger he had forgotten he was capable of feeling. He would not stare at the low ceiling overhead long before he rolled onto his side to climb down the ladder.

 

He felt heavy and clumsy, unsteady in the rocking of the boat. Disoriented as he was, he still recalled a bit of food he’d not finished the night before. He sought it out greedily, wolfing it down with a satisfied sigh. It was not much, but it would be enough to silence the rumbling for a while.

 

Once he’d finished and dusted the crumbs from his face, he peered about the tiny cabin, disappointed at the elf’s absence. He sat on the lower bunk, leaning back until he lie with his legs swung over the side. His depression crept into his ears and belly, seeping inward until it filled him with a strange, empty ache.

 

_Mage. I propose a bargain._

 

He scowled, willing himself to sit back up. The bed called to him, begging him to lie back down in its faux comfort, to allow it to pull him down with its destitute arms and cradle him to oblivion. Justice’s silence did nothing to help this, leaving the mage wondering if the spirit had left him, abandoning him to his fate and spurring him towards mammoth destruction.

 

No, he was still there. Quiet, but ever present, like a splinter under the skin.

 

Rising from the bunk, he resolved to honor the bargain he’d made with the elf. Maker knew he had no idea how, but he figured the first step might be leaving the cabin.

 

When he went topside, he was greeted by brilliant sunshine. It was oppressive and blinding, and he realized he had not been above deck since they left Kirkwall. He cursed the intense light, shielding his eyes from the thing. It nearly drove him back below until a rich, honeyed voice spoke beside him.

 

“Look who’s still alive,” Isabela cooed, entirely amused by his struggle. “Oh, and you look like shit, sweeting. With how long you spent withering away in a hole, I’d almost thought you’d died down there.”

 

Anders scowled, an arm over his brow to shield his still-adjusting eyes from the sun. It was hot standing in it, his thick, feathered coat suddenly becoming a sweaty burden. “Bet you would’ve liked that,” he muttered.

 

Isabela’s smirk vanished, offering instead an exaggerated eye roll.

 

The mage stopped, feeling guilty immediately.

_...you spit venom at her at every turn like a viper. Be thankful…_

 

“Wait,” he winced as she began to turn away. “I’m...I’m sorry.”

 

For a moment, the pirate looked surprised. Recovering quickly, she smirked, looking him up and down with that same detached amusement. “Are you, now?”

 

“Yes. I…” he could hear the elf in the back of his mind still, angry and demanding that he put things right. Or was it Justice? For a moment, he could not tell. “...I’ve been a bit of a sore arse.”

 

“Is that what you call it? I’d say you’ve been a sore arse since I’ve known you, and not even just a bit,” she laughed, leaning on the rail. “Though I must admit, I couldn’t resist poking at you. I’m like a child with a stick that’s stumbled across a body. I can’t help it.”

 

Anders held onto the railing as well, finding the pronounced rocking of the boat awkward for standing without support. He glared at her, “I’m trying to apologize!”

 

Amusement mingled with a look strangely akin to sympathy, and he inclined her head towards him. “You’re not very good at it, though, are you? You know, I recall a time, quite a long while ago, when you had more of a sense of humor. Chip on your shoulder, sure, but you knew how to laugh. Did your spirit take that from you?”

 

The mage was cowed by her, unable to meet her gaze. With a bitter sigh, a hand lifted to rub hard at his face. “Maker. I don’t know. I can’t remember the last time I felt like laughing.”

 

“Well, find a way to get it back. You and the elf are about as humorless together as a pair of darkspawn,” she huffed, exhausted at the very thought of their interactions. “And here I thought you might help him lighten up with that Danarius business. He wasn’t going to let anyone else help him, was he?”

 

Anders’ hand fell, his full attention on the wench now. “What?”

 

“Who do you think told Varric  about Broody’s sister?” she winked. Deciding to leave the conversation there, she turned and walked away.

 

The mage watched her walk away, completely dumbfounded and speechless.

 

Leaning on the railing fully, he looked out over the blue horizon, blinking as he turned his back to the sun. His sore eyes were beginning to adjust to the light, and in the heat, the spray of the sea and the considerable amount of sweat pooling at his back, he could feel how unwashed and disgusting he was. A shred of vanity prodded at his brain, and he felt a compulsion to seek out a mirror.

 

“I am impressed, mage,” Fenris joined him at the railing, eyeing him with approval. “I had not thought you would be in daylight so soon.”

 

Anders bristled at his new company, still agitated from his conversation with Isabela. A part of him was angry at them both for meddling, a part of him was sullen over the past, and another part of him still was pleased that he had done something to garner approval from the elf. He was so handsome when he was being kind.

_This is the one who took his pleasure from you out of spite. This is the one who hates mages. He cannot hate mages and care for you._

 

The mage scowled as the previously silent Justice spoke up at last. Strange that he should be so placated in the depths of depression, but the moment he comes up for air, the hands of Vengeance take hold.

 

He shoved the darkness away. “I...needed some air.”

 

“I...am pleased to see you out of the cabin,” the elf admitted, looking away in uncharacteristic shyness.

 

Anders studied his face, marvelling at the change in attitude from months before. It was like a different person entirely stood before him. Whoever it was, he liked it. “Fenris…”

 

“Hm?” the elf glanced in his direction, looking almost...content.

 

“I…” he started. Shaking his head, he closed his mouth, unable to find the right words to express how he felt. “...thank you.”

 

Fenris did not look directly at him, though his face was turned toward the mage. The barest hint of a kind smile peeked through his stony exterior, sunlight catching on his white hair. As quickly as it had come, it was gone, and the elf looked away.

 

Anders felt his heart stop. He had never thought to see Fenris smile. That aside, he had never felt his heart so moved by the other. Looking away himself, he felt the heat of a blush on his cheeks. “H-how are you feeling?”

 

At that, Fenris straightened, looking out over the water with a wistful gaze. “Different.”

 

“Your markings don’t hurt then?” he asked.

 

“No,” Fenris sighed, turning to him at last, an increasing sense of discomfort apparent in his face. “Being touched by magic is...uncomfortable. The memories it stirs…” Some of the anger he was used to seeing trickling back into the other’s face. “...there are things that haunt me. That said...I am finding that all magic does not feel the same on them. There is something about you I can feel in it, and it makes it easier to manage. Even so, living without pain is...not something I am accustomed to. I am not certain what I prefer.”

 

“Is that a good thing? Hard to tell with you,” Anders gave a half-hearted laugh, a thing that tasted bittersweet as it came out.

 

Fenris turned fully toward the mage, eyes wandering over him in appraisal. Concern creased his brow, but he did not comment on it. “It is...something.”

 

…

 

Dairsmuid was almost overwhelming compared to the relative isolation Isabela’s ship had offered. Anders shifted uncomfortably in front of the inn the pirate had left them at, feeling vulnerable and exposed in the open public.

 

…

_“Go to the Merman’s Trident,” Isabela had said, hours after they’d docked. She had gone to make certain arrangements in preparation for them to leave the ship. “Ask for Nina. She’ll take care of you for two days. After that, you sweet little ducklings are on your own.”_

_“It is more than sufficient,” Fenris nodded. “Thank you.”_

_Anders looked to her before they set off, face contorted in regret. “Isabella...I…”_

_“Oh, none of that now,” she lifted a finger, nose wrinkling in distaste. “Just mind yourselves, and don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”_

_“It is good to know our options are open, then,” Fenris shot her a crooked grin._

_Anders scoffed. Had Fenris just made...a joke? A bristle of jealousy set his jaw tense. A smile, a jest...he tried not to be bothered at the lack in those departments that he shared with him._

_Isabela laughed, her gaze becoming wistful. “Oh, get out of here, you lot, before I claim you as part of my ship’s crew!”_

 

...

 

Anders would ever be thankful to that woman, as much as he wanted to strangle her. At least she’d helped disguise them.

 

He felt naked without his feather-pauldroned coat. Leaving it behind had been remarkably hard, the thing being one of the few comforts he’d allowed himself for a long time. He had plucked a feather from it, tucking it into the same small, sewn pocket on his small pillow as he had a bit of Ser Pounce-a-lot’s fur. His keepsake was tucked into the plain, dusty-brown jacket he wore now. Isabela had lent him one of her headscarves, covering most of the golden blonde hair with it. His leggings and boots had been swapped with one of the pirates’, and they didn’t smell very lovely either.

 

Neither did he. Maker, he was glad to be on land. He needed a bath.

 

Fenris had not bothered to change. Between the veins of lyrium ghosting white over his face and his snowy white hair, he stuck out like a sore thumb anyhow. The most he managed was a hooded cloak. Perhaps it would be disguise enough at a distance.

 

When they pushed their way into the inn, they were greeted by a very old woman smothered in perfume, coiled in scarves and cloth in a way that made the mage picture a series of shredded quilts in the back room.

 

“What has Isabela sent me this time, heeeeeh?” she leaned forward, the wrinkled, diminutive woman standing far too close as she examined the pair. “She would not tell Grandmama who her friends were. That means you’re both trouble, I wager, I do.”

 

“You are Nina,” Fenris stately in a low, rasping voice.

 

“And the manners of an old sock, is what you have, boy,” she jabbed a finger in his direction. “I can smell the trouble on ye. Well, upstairs with you. I’ll not have you linger in the door and curse my house. Trouble begets trouble, I say.”

 

“Thank you, madam. You’re very kind to-” Anders started.

 

“No silver tongue-in’ me,” she snapped, cutting him off. “Up, up. Git now.”

 

They found themselves quickly shuffled upstairs to a room, the old woman looking between them suspiciously. “Isabela is one I owed a favor, and it’s two nights you get until we’re even, girl and I. After that you pay, or I have my girls toss you right out. I ain’t a blighted charity.”

 

“We will leave tomorrow, rest assured,” Fenris scowled, unamused by the woman. “We like the arrangement as well as you.”

 

Pursing her lips, she eyed the elf up and down before nodding. Without another word, she turned on her heel and stormed out the room, slamming the door roughly behind her.

 

Anders looked around the room, feeling a mixture of relief and foreboding. He looked to Fenris, who sat on the bed, leaning forward to rest his elbows on his knees, scowling at the floor. The mage approached him, silence heavy in the air between them before he finally spoke.

 

“So, we’re in Dairsmuid. What now?” he asked.

 

Fenris looked up at him. “We find the mages here.”

 

“What?” he asked, incredulous.

 

“We find a Seer. Mages here commonly consort with demons-”

 

“Spirits.”

 

“-demons, and one of them might know something about getting that thing out of you,” Fenris spat, irritated at the interruption.

 

The mage opened his mouth to respond, then shut it. He had no idea what to say, or how to feel.

 

“So long as you are an abomination, you are a danger to all,” Fenris did not look up at him. “I...have only killed abominations before. Curing them is...was unthinkable. I am told that one can rid a mage of a demon by killing it in the Fade-”

 

“No!” Anders recoiled, blue light wicking around his eyes.

 

Fenris stood at the sign of the demon surfacing, hands at his sides, dark glare fixed upon the mage. “I was not finished. Control yourself.”

 

The mage looked away, the glow fading. Drawing a slow, shuddering breath, he knew the elf was right. Losing himself to his emotion only proved the other’s point. He could feel Justice bristling inside him, demanding and violent, sounding more like Vengeance now than he ever had before. “You...you’re right.”

 

Fenris scowled, now on guard. “These...Rivaini mages. Their circle is so in name only, so I am told by Isabela. They commonly commune with such demons on a regular basis, are allowed free reign of the city, and might be able to find a way to separate you from your demon without killing either of you.”

 

Anders brightened immediately. “Do you...think they really might?”

 

The elf looked away. “Do not get your hopes up, mage. There is no guarantee that they can remove it without killing it.”

 

“Him,” Anders frowned. “It’s him. And he is still my friend.”

 

The elf was unamused. “If he cannot be removed without resulting in his death, would you still do so?”

 

“I...I don’t know,” he shifted uncomfortably.

 

Fenris looked to him, a fraction of his fury replaced with concern. “Could you not save yourself instead of leaving yourself doomed? You will ever be in danger as an abomination.”

 

“I just...cannot choose between myself and a friend,” Anders sulked, sinking into a chair beside the table. “You’re right. I...don’t know if he is still a spirit. My anger may have corrupted him into a demon. Maker, I don’t know anymore. But this was my fault. It was my idea, and it was my anger that hurt him. I...it’s not right to kill him for mistakes I made.”

 

The elf boiled and seethed, though he said nothing. Anders could see it in his face.

 

“Fenris…”

 

“I will not have saved you to lose you to a demon,” the elf growled.

 

The mage cringed, his heart wrung in his chest. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I will...at least think on what you say.”

 

The elf sat back down on the edge of the bed, his mood considerably soured. He said nothing more, instead intent on brooding.

 

Anders sighed, rising to his feet. “I...I’m going to take a bath.”

 

Fenris did not respond, nor did he look in the other’s direction. He glared at the floor, still seething in his silent rage.

 

His own mood souring, he turned and strode over to the tub, working the lever to pump water into the bath. It was taxing, especially considering how little exercise he’d gotten while on the ship. When the thing was only half full, he had to pause, leaning heavily onto the lever, entirely exhausted by his efforts. He caught his breath as he rested, his anger and irritation sapped out by the labor.

 

The elf cast an annoyed glance in his direction, watching him struggle for a moment before eventually sighing in exasperation. Standing, he came to the mage’s side. “Move,” he rasped the command.

 

Anders stood aside, his arms aching. Maker, he needed to exercise. Weeks of precious little food, less sun than he ought to have had, little water and strained sleep had taken a heavy toll on his health. He still hadn’t had the nerve to look into a mirror.

 

Fenris pumped the rest of the tub full of water, rocking the thing up and down as though he were see-sawing a hot knife through warm butter. The mage hated how easy he made it look, cursing his own weakness. Still, he was grateful for the assistance.

 

When Fenris had finished pumping the water, Anders set his hands in the cold pool. A glow illuminated the water as he cast fire into it, heating the water until steam pleasantly rose from the surface.

 

“I know you don’t like magic, but...a hot bath won’t be so terrible, will it?” Anders looked up to him, unfastening the buckles of his jacket.

 

Fenris watch him undress with growing tension, hungry eyes following the work of his thin hands. The mage took note of this, growing more slow and precise with his movements. Deft fingers danced the clasps undone, peering up up at the other with a shy pout. He shrugged out of his jacket with care, folding his keepsake pillow up with it to set it neatly aside on the chair. A tunic was pulled up and over his head, his thin, malnourished figure bare of torso.

 

With a groan, the elf descended upon him, seizing the mage’s waist in his arms, lips crashing against his the moment the tunic was out of the way. Anders mewled into his mouth, yielding in his arms. Fenris groaned, hands wandering over his bare flesh, eager and demanding in their journey.

 

Anders unlatched the clasp of his cloak, allowing it to fall behind the elf carelessly. Hands immediately sought out his armor, more adept now at removing it than he had been before. Fenris unlaced the other’s leggings, jerking his hips as he pulled roughly at the ties. His work would pause a moment for the armor at his arms to clatter to the floor, gauntlets quickly thereafter pulled off and joining the others.

 

Fenris pulled down the mage’s leggings the moment the lacings were undone, Anders obligingly stepped out of the cloth to stand bare before the elf that knelt before him. When Fenris looked up, he found the hardened shaft of the other at eye level, crouched as he was. He stilled, as though entranced by the vision before him. Hesitantly, he tested the head of Anders’ cock with his tongue, awkward and apprehensive as he did so.

 

The mage whimpered, hands coming to rest at the elf’s shoulders. Looking down at the proud elf, blushing and tongue flicking over his length, he groaned. The elf had thus far been reluctant to put his mouth to the mage’s length, and Anders had a good enough idea of why that might have been. To see him overcome, to watch the tentative prodding, to know that it was something that had been built towards and was telltale of a comfort level achieved with the other...Anders felt his heart pound.

 

Fenris took the head into his mouth. When the mage bucked his hips reflexively, inserting the slightest bit more in, the elf growl, hands roughly shoving his hips until his rear end collided with the edge of the tub. He forcefully pinned the hips of the mage down, unwilling and in a way unable to go farther with his task than he was prepared for.

 

Anders cursed his own anxiousness. It did not matter anymore what the elf had done to him, he did not want to cross boundaries Fenris was not ready for. He had made so much progress with the former slave, the man now his only companion. He could not bear to drive him away.

 

More and more of the length was taken into the elf’s mouth until he felt him gag around him. At this, Fenris pulled away, turning his face from Anders even as he left his firm, pressing hands at his hips.

 

“You...don’t need to…” Anders started, bending at the waist to take his face in his hands, gentle touch asking for the return of his gaze.

 

Fenris looked up to the mage, for a moment looking so wounded it made his heart ache. His features quickly hardened into disgust, the elf standing. Anders embraced him, his arms tight around the sturdy figure of the elf.

 

“Fenris…” he murmured like a plea.

 

The elf was tense in his arms at first, until he slowly let loose his tension in a sigh, arms snaking about the mage’s waist and returning the embrace. He buried his face in the crook of Anders’ neck, holding him tightly while the mage waited patiently for him to sort out his emotions.

 

_The elf can force himself into your mouth, but we must be patient with him? Weakness. You roll over like a dog for this monster_ , Vengeance hissed in his skull. _He has not changed. He will never care for you out of spite for what you are. One day you will need to destroy him for the greater good._

 

Anders turned, lips in Fenris’ ashen hair, and muttered, “Let’s take a bath.” His dark thoughts set a vice around his heart, uncertainty plaguing him. He clung to his affection for the elf to stow it away in the pit of his stmach.

 

Fenris tensed in his arms for a moment, silence thick in the air. “Very well,” he managed eventually.

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love reading all your comments. It gives me motivation to write more. Thank you! T_T


	7. The Proposition

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A serving girl offers to help Fenris and Anders...for a price.

The first hot, fresh meal they’d had in weeks was better than any meal either of them could recall having. For the first time in as long as Fenris had known him, Anders stuffed himself like an anxious dog. While his own appetite had certainly been ravenous, he was relieved to see the mage taking better care of himself.

 

While he was still over-thin and weakened by his lack of self-care, the dark circles under his eyes were already lightening. He had a long way to go to get back to where he’d been when he’d first met the man, but progress was progress.

 

It surprised him, how as each week went by he found himself a little more attentive to the mage’s moods and states, a little more invested in his well-being, and a little more considerate of his feelings. He could no longer say he truly hated the mage, even in the slightest.

 

The demon within him was another matter. That he most certainly did hate. At times it was almost easy to forget that it linger under the surface, as volatile and dangerous as gaatlok. The closer he became to Anders, the more invasive the demon felt. At times, he wondered if he could reach into the mage with a phased hand and yank the thing out by force.

 

How he wished it could be so simple.

 

And how infuriated he was by the mage’s attitude! It had never been a secret that Anders loved his demon, cherished it as a friend, and would be protective of it. When he’d set out on this fool’s errand to separate them and save the mage, he knew he would not comply unless special care was taken for the demon.

 

A demon. _How could he care so for a demon?_

 

Fenris looked up from his plate as a dark-haired serving girl approached him, setting down a mug of water. She eyed him, not masking the bemused desire in her gaze. “You boys sure can eat. It’s good to see a man with an...appetite.”

 

The elf regarded her with weary amusement, evident in his eyes yet not touching his lips. “We have been at sea for some time.”

 

From the corner of his eye he could see the mage beginning to sulk. _Fasta vass_ , this jealousy was getting old. The mage would need to overcome such things if they were to get any information out of anyone. For someone so anxious to martyr themselves as he, he was remarkably childish.

 

“Have you? You don’t look like sailors, love,” she smirked.

 

“We aren’t,” he replied, ignoring the quickly souring mood of the mage.

 

He could recall a conversation with Isabela he’d overheard while they’d been out traveling with Hawke, once. He garnered from it that the mage had once sought pleasures of the flesh to excess, with a number of people. There had also been a comment about electricity, though he was uncertain if he wished to have that elaborated on. It did not seem like that had been about the person who had sat before him now, whose petty jealousy ate at him so. It was tiresome, to say the least. After all, he’d made no promise of himself to the mage concerning fidelity.

 

Ah, but were the mage to say the same, would he be so nonchalant? He filed that thought away for later.

 

“So then what brings you boys to us? Not that I complain about the view, mind you,” she swayed her rear end from side to side as she leaned over the table, gaze flitting between them like a child that didn’t know which of his sweets to eat first.

 

“We are looking for a Seer,” Fenris spoke honestly.

 

At that, she laughed, a rich, silken sound. “Is that so? Well. Perhaps I could help point you towards one.”

 

“That would be kind of you,” the elf forced a smile, mirth not reaching his eyes. He was not certain what game this woman was playing, and he certainly did not like being in a country where mages were allowed loose in the streets. She gave the impression now that she wanted something by the way she looked between them, and in a land of unruly magic, that was never a good thing.

 

“Kindness is rarely free, my loves,” she smiled wistfully, suddenly becoming more serious.

 

Ah. There is was. This woman was manipulating and calculating. He could see it in her eyes, hear it in her voice. His dislike of the woman quickly grew from moderate to severe.

 

“And I assume that your kindness comes with a price?” Fenris spoke, brows knitting into a frown.

 

“Doesn’t everyone’s?” she pouted. “Don’t you boys want to help a sweet girl like me?”

 

“Get on with it, already,” Anders huffed, his patience with the woman waning.

 

“Right. Well…” she tapped a finger to her chin. Turning, she leaned closer to Anders, suddenly rather smug. Fenris didn’t care a fig for it. “...I couldn’t help but notice with my skillful little eye that the _sword_ at your side…” she lowered her voice, “...is actually a staff. You’re a mage.”

 

Fenris tensed, the hand under the table the rest upon his knee fisting. He studied her now with the focus of a predator, ready to reach a hand into her ample chest to rip her heart out should she try anything. He did not like how insightful she was into their business, and he did not like the idea she might be a threat to his mage.

 

. _..his mage?_

 

“Andraste’s tits,” Anders swore under his breath between clenched teeth.

 

The girl squeaked, her cheeks coloring, “Oh, oh, I didn’t mean to...look, I just need a little help with something! Actually, it’s...it’s a matter of life and death. Please....” Her cheery mood suddenly dropped, for a moment her eyes tearing up.

 

_No_ , Fenris wanted to spit.

 

“We help you, you help us?” Anders responded for them, a look of reluctant acceptance on his face.

 

“You scratch my back, I scratch yours,” she clasped her hands together hopefully.

 

Fenris looked to the mage now, unable to hide the scowl from his face. The moment Anders noticed it, he scoffed, saying to his companion, “What, you want to go knocking door to door across the whole city? If you have another plan, this would be a wonderful time to spit it out.”

 

He had not, in fact, thought that far. He’d scarcely thought beyond getting to the city. It was not as if he knew anyone here, now that Isabela had moved along. The closest thing they’d made to a friend was Nina and that was...not promising. Still, he could not help but wonder at the wisdom of taking up the cause of the first person they’d spoken to.

 

At his silence, the mage practically snorted, “I didn’t think so.” Looking now to the young woman beside them, he leaned his cheek on his hand, entirely unamused by the situation himself. “Well, it can’t hurt to at least hear you out.”

 

Exhaling in relief, she spoke in a lowered voice. “Look, I can’t exactly tell you here. Meet me out back after dark tonight and I’ll tell you everything. It will be worth your time, I promise.” With that she left, returning to her serving duties.

 

Anders looked at the scowling Fenris with a matching scowl. “Don’t look at me like that.”

 

“I will look at you however I please,” he spat.

 

“Look, I’m _trying_. Isn’t that what you wanted?” he snapped in return bitterly.

 

“Considering the position we are in, what I wanted was to not involve ourselves in matters we know nothing about. There are a hundred ways this could go wrong, and...I am not getting into this here.” Fenris stood, furious at the way things had turned. “Come. We are leaving.”

 

“Fine. But we’re coming back tonight,” Anders replied just as sorely.

 

....

 

“This is a mistake,” Fenris muttered in a low, rasping tone.

 

“You’ve said that,” Anders sighed.

 

The two stood behind the Merman’s Trident, waiting for the young woman to show. The past several hours had been spent bickering over the course of action they would take. Despite complaining the whole way, the elf had gone along with the mage’s plan, if only to encourage his active involvement in trying to rid himself of the demon within him.

 

They waited for nearly twenty minutes before the young woman showed herself, sidestepping an old man sleeping on the ground in the alleyway. “Ah! You came! I hope you didn’t wait long.”

 

“No, it wasn’t long. Now please, tell us what you need,” Anders greeted her with impatience, though his tone was fairly soft and kind.

 

“Come. There are ears all over this place. Let’s walk a ways,” she gestured for them to follow, already heading to the north.

 

Anders looked to Fenris, who in turn shot him an exasperated eye roll, gesturing for him to go first. The mage bristled slightly, but indeed started walking after the young woman with Fenris in tow.

 

As they walked, the girl would look over her shoulder between them. “Oh, by the way, I’m Adora,” she made conversation. “What may I call you?”

 

“A-” Anders started, but was quickly cut off by Fenris.

 

“I am Keran,” Fenris cut in fluidly. “This is Wilmod. Now where are you taking us?”

 

“A little further,” she glanced at him once more, apologetic in visage and tone. “I really appreciate you at least hearing me out. You’ll do so much good, you’ll see.”

 

“I’m sure,” Fenris replied, his voice thick with sarcasm. Anders shot him a glare, but said nothing.

 

…

 

Anders did not miss that the alias he was assigned by the elf was the name of another abomination they’d once killed with Hawke. Overall, he was rather unimpressed with the other’s behavior.

 

He understood the need for caution, and he well knew they were likely pursued by templars and Maker knew what else. Yet they had to start somewhere, and the mage wanted to do something to help. It was infuriating that where he tried to step in and contribute, the elf only spit on his efforts.

_Because he wants you to be weak. To follow. To control you. He is no better than your personal templar jailor._

 

Anders clenched a hand at his side, examining his own mind. Vengeance was ever bitter in his skull, and at times it took concentration to pick out his voice among his own thoughts. It was disturbing how they bled together, and as the presence grew darker and more hostile, Anders felt himself increasingly afraid of himself. Their separation could not come too soon.

  
He wondered if he could contain Vengeance until then.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You get two chapters today! Wheeee!


	8. Hell Hath No Fury...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adora leads them to a maleficar, and things go badly for everyone.

“We’re here,” the woman said at last after a long silence marred only by footsteps. She spoke quietly, despite there being no one else around in earshot.

 

“And where is here?” Fenris asked without amusement.

 

“Keep it down! He’s in the house up there!” she hissed, pressed a finger to her lips.

 

“Who? What is going on?” Anders demanded in a harsh whisper, tiring of her games himself.

 

“It’s...a blood mage,” she admitted, wringing her hands nervously as she looked over her shoulder. “He’s been terrorizing the local girls, and I was hoping you’d run him out of town.”

 

“A what?” Anders glared at her, mouth agape in indignant shock.

 

Fenris’ fists were clenched tight at his sides, the gaze he leveled upon the girl unkind. “Then why have you not told the templars?” he asked, voice laced with venomous doubt.

 

“Because she is a mage herself,” Anders answered, realization dawning on him. It all connected now. Why she knew what he was, why she could not speak of it in public. Not involving templars confirmed it. How could an apostate go to the templars without condemning themselves? All at once, he reasserted within himself his conviction to help this girl, his reasons suddenly becoming more personal.

 

It was a story he’d seen before, mages trying to do something right and having no means to get help without being imprisoned. Time and time again maleficar and abomination alike had been allowed to do monstrous things with good people too afraid to speak up, all because of the templars. It was all this injustice that he read into this situation now, outraged that the elf posed himself as antagonist here instead of supporting what was right.

 

_He mentions templars at the first sign of magic. Do you not see how toxic that is? Look at him. It looks as though he might rip out her throat. How many mages will he murder before you see what he is?_

 

“A-as you say, ser,” she bowed her head, shrinking back from them, apprehensive at having her secret so blatantly stated.

 

Fenris was not so moved as Anders. His dark gaze was still leveled on the woman, eyes full of malice. Glancing over to Anders, his expression darkened, fury contorting his handsome face into a bitter scowl.

 

_How quickly he turns on you when he is surrounded by mages._

 

To the mage’s surprise, Fenris heaved a sigh, backing down. Though he still look troubled, he remained silent, gaze becoming fixed to the ground. Anders was baffled by this, and did not know what to think.

 

“Look, I know it sounds like trouble, and it might be. It’s just...he keep cornering us girls. He threatens us if we don’t...please him. One girl he forced to...to...with blood magic…” the girl’s eyes watered, shoulders shaking as she spoke. “Please, Serah Wilmod, Serah Keran. Please...we’re so frightened…”

 

Anders did not need to think about this. “Of course we’ll help you. You cannot go to the templars. I understand that better than anyone. You said he’s in the house up the way?”

 

“Yes,” she murmured, wiping her eyes. “The one with the broken window and the lantern over the door. It’s my friend’s house, and he’s...on these nights he’s usually there. I don’t even know what he’s doing to her as we speak.”

 

Anders reached a tender hand out to rest it on her shoulder, his heart moved by her pleas. “Alright. Look, just go back to the tavern. You should be out of harm’s way.”

 

With a sniffle, she gave a slow nod. “N-no...I’ll wait here. I’ll be alright if I stay out this way.”

 

Fenris spoke up now, expression unreadable and voice a low rasp, “Then let us go and be done with this.”

 

Anders nodded, still confused by his sudden silent compliance. “Yes, we will go. Stay out of sight, Adora. We’ll be back.”

 

Looking up the road, the houses were built flush against one another, each shabby and run-down, clearly city slums. In the distance Anders could hear someone sickly coughing, some of the houses cast beams of warm glow onto the street from their windows. Some houses did not have windows at all. Some others still looked abandoned entirely. This was certainly not a well-populated area of the city’s slums.

 

They walked up a ways until they came upon the described house, a dull glow barely visible through a thin, ragged curtain hung in front of the broken window. They approached the door, the mage taking the lead. He would pause in front of it, pressing an ear to it to listen.

 

“...you will never…” Anders could just barely make certain words out from a male voice within. “...you are dead…”

 

Drawing in a sharp breath he set a hand on the door’s handle, turning it painfully slowly to test the lock without making noise. It was indeed locked.

 

There came a loud thumping noise from inside, and Anders was set into a panic. Drawing out his staff, he set his hand quickly on the door, blasting the doorknob clean out of the door with a bolt of energy. Kicking the door in, he rushed inside to save the poor girl who was clearly being slammed into the floor. Fenris was at his heels, his own weapon drawn, lyrium taking on a dull glow.

 

When they burst inside, they did not expect to find a man standing alone, brandishing a thick, heavy tome as a weapon, the remnants of a rather large and frightening spider twitching and half-mashed into the bottom of a book.

 

He was a man with long, black hair that fell about his shoulders, his tanned chest bare in the flickering light of candles on the desk against the wall. Stubble darkened his cheeks and chin, his features clearly Fereldan. Gentle blue eyes regarded the pair of them with surprise and fear, the book falling from his hands. He glanced to the side, a staff leaned against the wall in the corner.

 

Fenris followed his gaze, immediately putting himself between the unarmed mage and his weapon. With a snarl, he rushed forward, lyrium bright, a hand phasing into the mage’s chest before he could blink. He gasped, hands clutching at the elf’s wrist, trembling from the pain. “Where is the girl?” Fenris growled.

 

“I...I can’t…” the dark-haired man gasped for air, hardly able to get the words out.

 

Anders studied the man, something...wrong...about the situation. There was something familiar about the man struggling in the elf’s grasp. When it dawned on him, it hit him hard. “Maker have mercy...Jowan!?”

 

The man could not respond. Fenris glanced to Anders, not releasing the man from his grasp. “You know this maleficar?”

 

“Yes, I…” Anders searched his memory for everything he could recall. He’d known Jowan fairly well, and there were many times they’d even spoken of their dreams of fleeing the tower together. The lad had always been too terrified to actually try, unlike Anders, who had attempted to flee many times. That was, until he fell for a chantry sister and attempted to elope with her. He had used blood magic in his escape when the sister had turned him into the templars to save her own skin, so he’d been told. The last he heard of the man, the Hero of Fereldan had freed him from the dungeons after he’d poisoned Arl Eamon. “Fenris, let him go. I need to talk to him properly.”

 

The elf allowed his grasp to linger on the other’s heart, glaring at the dark-haired man with murderous intent for a long moment. Eventually, he complied, allowing the man to slip from his grasp. Jowan fell to the floor gasping for air, a hand clutching his chest as he wheezed and coughed.

 

“Jowan,” Anders looked down at the other mage, his own staff ready in hand. The Jowan he remembered was a kind, if not a bit misguided soul, but eight years was a long time, and people could change. Maker knows Anders himself had.

 

“A...Anders?” the darker mage looked up to him once he’d caught his breath. “Wh-what’s going on? I don’t…”

 

“No, don’t,” Anders grit his teeth, his heart wrenched in his chest at the thought of his childhood friend turning to such evils. “I know you’re a blood mage. I know what you’ve been doing.”

 

Jowan looked panicked, too frightened of Fenris to properly stand, so he remained on his knees. “No, I’m not! Not any more! Maker, I don’t know how to be more sorry for what I’ve done. Anders, please…”

 

“First blood magic, Arl Eamon, and now this?” he asked in disgust. “I should let him kill you.”

 

“Wait...what?” Jowan cried, utterly confused. “I did use blood magic, and I poisoned Arl Eamon, but I...I’ve been doing everything I could to atone. I’ve been healing the sick, I’ve helped those in need...I haven’t done anything else. I swear it!”

 

“You lie. Adora told us everything,” Anders clutched his staff so hard his knuckles turned white.

 

“A..adora. Of course she did. Maker have mercy,” Jowan’s face fell into his hands. “I can’t believe she’d see me killed for that.”

 

Anders scowled, still on edge. “Wh-what are you talking about?”

 

Jowan looked between them, still frightened of Fenris. “Look, I don’t know what she’s told you, but Adora is the blood mage. She wanted me to train her, and I refused. I want nothing more to do with blood magic and the like. Please, you have to believe me!”

 

It was Fenris who spoke now. “I believe you.”

 

Anders looked to him in shock. “You do?”

 

The elf glanced to the fairer mage, his face caught in a silent snarl. “Something in that bitch reminds me of Hadriana. I could tell she was lying. She was manipulating us from the start.”

 

“Why didn’t you tell me this sooner?” Anders frowned, furious that he was just hearing this now.

 

“You only have ears for the wrongs mages suffer. Had I voiced my concerns, would you have truly listened, and not dismissed them as my distrust of mages?” the elf spat bitterly. “We’re wasting time.”

 

Andraste preserve him, the elf was right. He would not have listened. It was not as though he had not voiced any concerns, either, and he’d listened to none of those. Swallowing his sudden shame for now, he turned back to Jowan. “I’m sorry, she had told us...well. She told us enough to allow us to think you needed to be stopped.”

 

“It’s alright,” Jowan slowly stood, glancing between the two warily. “Besides, there are things that I have done that I can never atone for. I’m glad it was you who found me, or she may have well gotten me killed. She hounds me day and night, harassing me, and...Maker. I don’t know how to be rid of her.”

 

“I can think of a way,” Fenris suggested darkly.

 

Anders winced. “I’ve gotten us into trouble, haven’t I?”

 

Fenris looked to him, the intensity of his gaze softening. “It is...good to see you invested in our goals, at least.”

 

“She promised you something,” Jowan connected the dots. “Please, what was it?”

 

“We...need to see a Seer,” Anders replied sullenly. “She told us she could help us.”

 

Jowan winced. “I doubt that. Her great aunt is a Seer, but they haven’t been on speaking terms for years.”

 

“So what do we do with you, then?” Fenris looked to the darker mage, stalking a circle around him like a predator.

 

“We do nothing!” Anders scoffed. “Jowan is my friend, and is as much a victim here as we are!”

 

“Yet he is a maleficar,” the elf retorted.

 

“No, I’m not!” Jowan cried. “I’m not anymore!”

 

“I have never seen a maleficar turn away from power they’ve acquired. If you were so weak once, you would be again,” Fenris explained matter-of-factly, grip on his sword still tight.

 

“Fenris!” Anders hissed in a scolding tone.

 

The elf looked to his companion with disgust, but eventually raised his sword to sheath it at his back. “You trust too easily.”

 

Jowan spoke to Anders, his wary gaze fixated on the elf. “Anders, he’s right to doubt me. Every drop of blood spilt for magic is a curse for both target and caster, and I’ve done it enough to know. I’m not defending what I’ve done, but I’ve spent seven years trying to atone. Can we all just agree not to kill the nice mage who just wants to help?”

 

“Yes, we can,” Anders glared to the elf. “But we have a problem. Adora is waiting for us outside.”

 

Jowan groaned, “Oh, shit.”

 

Anders thought for a moment, then looked to the elf once more, this time with vague amusement. “Actually, why let this linger? Fenris, would you be so kind as to invite our manipulating friend inside?”

 

At this, the elf shot his mage a dark, murderous grin. “It would be my pleasure.” Fenris stalked from the house, eager to get his hands on the mage girl.

 

“Are you mad?” Jowan cried as he left, gesturing after the elf. “This...this is going to get out of hand! She’s been out for my blood for months. Maker, you don’t want to be at the wrong end of one of her grudges.”

 

Anders set a hand on the shoulder of his old friend, smiling reassuringly. “We’ll sort this out. You’ll see.”

 

The other mage looked to him, doubt barring hope from surfacing. “Alright. But when she becomes an abomination, then I get to say I told you so.”

 

“I hope for her sake she doesn’t take that route,” he winced. “Fenris is...not the most mage-friendly sort.”

 

“I can see that! How did you pick that one up?” Jowan shuddered.

 

“That’s...a long story,” Anders shifted uncomfortably.

 

They fell into an uncomfortable silence for a moment, Jowan frantically pacing and periodically glancing to the door. It would not be long before Fenris would return, fingers laced in the hair of a frightened Adora, struggling against the elf’s grip with a string of curses. She would be thrown to the ground before them, landing with a thud on her hands and knees.

 

“I’ll have you all fucking killed for this,” she hissed, quickly scrambling to her feet. She turned to the elf, then to the mage, then finally looked to Jowan. “Levyn,” she narrowed her eyes, voice dripping with venom. “I should have known it would be too much to ask for you to die.”

 

“Adora, please,” Jowan, or _Levyn,_ plead with her. “Let this go. This doesn’t need to go this far.”

 

“Adora, please continue to spit filth from your mouth. It will make it more satisfying when I tear your lying throat out,” Fenris sneered at her, the lyrium glowing eerily, casting a blue halo over his figure.

 

“Let’s all just talk about this,” Anders tried to reason with them. “No one needs to die here.”

 

“What, so you’re going to rape me, then? Is that why you’ve dragged me here alive?” she spoke through gritted teeth.

 

“Maker’s breath, no!” Anders recoiled, disgusted by the suggestion.

 

Looking to Fenris, she smirked, wild and wicked in her gaze. “Oh, not your type, is that it? It’s this one, isn’t it. Pops your cork for you, doesn’t he?”

 

Anders set a hand over his mouth as his face turned scarlet in mortification. Jowan looked to his old friend with a grimace, muttering, “I told you she was foul.”

 

“You should have kept your mouth shut, you little stain,” she visibly tensed, hands fisting at her sides. “And you all should have done as I said. We all could have walked away from this happy. Except for you, sweet, sweet Levyn. You would have been dead.”

 

“Adora, it’s wrong! Blood magic is...it’s never ended well for those that use it. The more of us that use it, the more we condemn ourselves to the oppression of circles and towers. You don’t know what it’s like beyond Rivain…” Jowan attempted reason, speaking the same thoughts on the matter Anders felt to be true.

 

Anders looked to Jowan with admiration for a moment, caught up in appreciation for another mage that saw reason, and righteousness. So many were cowed by fear, seeking easy solutions out. If that had been Jowan once, it did not seem to be any longer.

 

“You’re too chicken shit to use it, that’s your problem,” she shot him an icy glare. “Pass it on to someone who hasn’t been neutered by their own stupid, short-sighted fear.”

 

Jowan looked to Anders, “Look, I know you wanted to help, but you’ll never get her to see reason.”

 

Fenris chimed in, low and rasping, “Then we kill her.”

 

“No, I-” Anders started.

 

Adora cut him off. “Oh, you may certainly _try_ , elf.” Without warning, a sharp blast shot out from her in a ring, knocking all three men to their backs, upending the desk against the wall, spilling candles onto the wooden floor. Paper settled atop them, immediately igniting ablaze. Fenris’ sword clattered to the side, knocked from his grasp.

 

Before they could stand, before they’d even fully landed on the ground, she was after Fenris, dagger plucked from where she’d hidden it in her bosom, she lashed out at him wildly, blade tearing across the flesh of his shin. Flesh parted wide, bloody bone visible. As blood seeped from the wound it would bead and levitate, gathering at her palm in a floating orb. She sank her fingertips into it.

 

Fenris cried out, curling inward, then leaping to his feet. He would stumbled slightly from the large gash on his leg. Anders and Jowan both scrambled to their feet, leaping to action as well. Anders gathered his mana shot a bolt of lightening in her direction as Jowan ran to fetch his staff.

 

In a blur of motion, Fenris moved in the path of the lightening bolt, howling in agony as it struck him square in the chest. Electricity crackled through the metal of his armor, burning his chest and sending pain shooting through his entire body. Anders recoiled, sickened by the horror of realization.

 

Adora stood behind the elf with a maniacal grin on her face, eyes wide and furious as she manipulated the blood in her hands, moving the elf like a marionette on strings. Fenris struggled against the compulsions, slowing the movements she forced upon him. The lyrium was bright white, pulsing as the controlling mage tapped into their power.

 

“Lyrium tattoos!” she cooed with glee. “I was going to have you killed, but you’ll be far more useful as a pet. Don’t you agree?”

 

Fenris’ face was contorted in pure agony, his flesh aflame, his body not his own. “M-mage….help…” he plead desperately before his body lurched forward, snatching the greatsword from the ground and taking up a ready stance.

 

Anders watched helplessly as the maleficar sank her darkness into his companion. To have his body controlled by a blood mage, his will not his own, a slave to dark power...he knew full well the torture she was putting him through beyond the physical agony. Outrage shook him, hands trembling in fear and rage in equal measure.

_This is a poetic end for him. This is Justice._

The voice within him only fueled his fury further. “I will kill you for touching him,” he said darkly, voice dripping with venom. Despite his threat he did not attack for fear of Fenris being thrown into his path.

 

He was vaguely aware of the fire that had caught in the corner, flames wicking up the walls.

 

Jowan stood helplessly to the side as well, looking between the others in panic. Anders made note of his presence, but otherwise focused on the maleficar bitch that was touching his elf.

 

“Oh, you’ll kill me, will you?” she spoke in a sweet and honeyed voice. “Mm, I must have been right. This elf really has been giving it to you. Or has he been taking it?” she giggled girlishly. “For you to be so upset, he must be _delicious_. Let’s have a taste and see!”

 

Her fingers curled in his blood, Fenris quivering as he fought the compulsions. He took a lurching step toward her, then another, until he stood by her side. Green eyes were fixated on her, seething with hatred, as much as they were wide and terrified. Adora leaned against him, slinging an arm around his neck. A trembling arm snaked around her waist, holding her securely against his body, every point of contact a violation. She set her lips over his, his mouth forced to open and meet her tongue.

 

Anders gripped his staff tightly, his heart in a vice. Tears gathered in his eyes. He glanced to Jowan, seeking any sign of aid, of anything that could be done to make the gutting display in front of him stop.

 

Jowan was shrunk down, clutching his staff, dealing with some form of inner turmoil of his own. Not finding the help he sought, he looked back to the elf and the maleficar kissing him.

 

She broke the kiss after a time, peered back to Anders with a smug smirk. “My, my. I can see why you like him. He’s a real treat. Perhaps I ought to see how much farther the treat goes, hm? Would you like to see your pretty pet elf fuck me, right here in front of you?”

 

Anders cracked, crying out desperately. “Please! Please...I’ll do anything. Just...just let him go.”

 

Jowan looked up rather suddenly, straightening. “Maker forgive me. May you all forgive me. I’m so sorry.”

 

Anders look to Jowen, who now held a small blade in his hands. Adora shot her gaze to him as well, fury twisting her pretty face into ugly wrath. Before she could say a word the blade came down across his wrist, blood seeping from the wound and gathering before Jowan in myriad droplets.

 

“The little bitch had balls after all?” she scoffed, stepping back from Fenris, who now stood between Adora and Jowan.

 

“I only wanted to live in peace. I never wanted to touch this accursed magic again,” Jowan murmured quietly, a hand raising. Blood and power surged forth, colliding with Fenris and knocking him backward. Droplets sank into the blood on her hand, tainting the elf’s blood. Fenris stumbled, falling to a knee and stopping, her control disrupted by the opposing blood magic.

 

Adora snarled in fury, moving to Fenris with dagger in hand. Before she could sink it into him and retake control, the elf turned, a hand thrusting into her belly with a soft white glow. The light faded, and he ripped out her innards in one swift motion.

 

She fell against him, her body twitching and swelling grotesquely. Anders saw immediately what had begun to happen, and he stepped forward, swinging his staff sharply into her face, knocking her back toward where the flames had begun to grow quite large, heat seeping into the room dangerously. She lie on her back there as the change continued, the sickening cracking of bones and wet noises enough to make the stomach lurch.

 

Anders disregarded her for a moment, dashing to Fenris’ side as the elf collapsed. “Fenris! Oh, Maker. Fenris…” He set a hand over the gash in his leg, the blue glow of healing magic knitting his flesh anew, closing what had been opened. The broken lyrium marking came together again seamlessly with a tiny flash of light.

 

“A...matus…”Fenris looked up to him in weary relief before his eyes slid closed.

 

“Anders!” Jowan cried.

 

The mage turned quickly to face the abomination forming on the floor, the thing gliding upwards and setting itself neatly on its feet. It was grotesque and twisted, flesh remade as monster. He stepped protectively in front of Fenris. “Maleficar bitch!” he spat.

 

There was nothing left of Adora to respond. The abomination shuffled forward, launching bolts of fire at them. Anders slammed his staff to the ground, ice erupting upwards to shield against the flames. Jowan cast a cone of cold in response, as much to defend against the flames as to overshoot the abomination entirely and put out the flames raging in the corner.

 

The abomination barreled into the ice shield, shattering it, but stumbling in the process. Anders brought the end of his staff upward, knocking the thing across the head. Still weakened from weeks at sea, he was already growing weary, his blow not as hard as his first had been. Instead, he tapped into where his real strength lie.

 

He jabbed the end of his staff into the creature, funneling massive bolts of lightning into the thing. It shrieked and howled as it twitched and jerked, writhing under the spell.

 

When Jowan finished putting out the house so it did not burn to ashes with them in it, he turned and assisted in wrangling the abomination, his own staff belching forth spikes of ice.

 

Another blast shot out from the abomination, knocking the mages backwards. Both recovered quickly, standing in time with the creature. Jowan manifested stone, casting it as a projectile with massive force toward the creature. It caught the blow head-on, driving it backward. Anders called up forces of the mind, locking down the creature in paralysis, force pressing in from all sides to slowly crush the monster.

 

With one final, horrific shriek, the creature succumbed to the pressure, blood squirting out in jets, painting the walls and floor inky black. With a final shudder it ceased moving, motionless and savaged on the floor.

 

Anders was not satisfied. He cast a ball of fire at it, the sickening smell of corrupted flesh burning at their nostrils. With tears in his eyes, he sent another. Then another.

 

Jowan approached him delicately, setting a hand on his shoulder. “Anders...she’s dead.”

 

The mage stopped, chest heaving as he struggled to catch his breath. Weary and feeling ill, he turned away from the dead abomination and from Jowan, rushing back to the elf’s side. “Fenris…” he murmured, sinking to his knees beside his unmoving companion.

 

Two fingers were pressed to the elf’s neck, relieved to feel the steady beat of his heart. He took Fenris’ hand in his, his own heart racing, aching at the sight of the elf so abused.

 

_Leave him. You could be free of him if you left him in the street to die._

 

Jowan was behind him, sullen. “I’m so sorry, Anders. I had no idea her self-study with blood magic had become so advanced. Please...rest here until he recovers. He can take my bed.”

 

_Leave him to die!_

  
Anders looked to Jowan, tears in his eyes. “Help me move him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Double update because I love you.


	9. Laid Bare

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fenris is recovering from blood loss, and the pair come to some realizations in light of their recent encounter.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Back to the smut! Also, the most fluff yet.

Fenris woke slowly, only vaguely aware of a warmth beside him, enveloping him. As stimuli trickled into his senses, reinforcing the realness of the world around him, events came crashing back into his mind like a dwarven berserker.

 

His eyes snapped open, the wooden ceiling of a shabby, run-down shack over his head. Slow and steady breathing drew his gaze down to Anders. The mage lay beside him above the blankets, curled against him, head resting in the crook of his arm. He looked peaceful as he slept, dark circles heavy beneath his eyes.

 

Recent events trickled in, and the elf felt his heart burdened.

 

Adora’s face flashed across his mind, her lips against his, every fiber of his being screaming out against the compulsions of his movement, wanting more than anything to tear out her heart. He could still taste her tongue, sweet and unwelcome, invading his own as his mouth defied his wishes. He had wanted to bite her tongue clean off and spit it in her face.

 

He had wanted to do a great many things to her. He had been unable.

 

His stomach lurched as he thought of the maleficar controlling him, using him as thoroughly as any Magister might have. She reminded him so much of Hadriana, and he hated her for it. Even as he hated her, he was terrified. Terrified she might have made good on her threat to rape him in front of the mage, terrified that he might have hurt his mage at her bidding.

 

He had been careless to have been so caught off guard by the woman, and he cursed himself. If the mage had not been there…

 

Anders had saved his life. Again. As had the other mage, even if it had been achieved with blood magic.

 

He lifted a hand to rub at his temples, his head aching. Fingertips trailed to his eyes, finding moisture there. He wiped the offensive wetness away, refusing to indulge in such weakness. Nude as he found himself to be, he was feeling more vulnerable than he would have liked. When he got his armor back on, he knew he would feel more secure. He was not unaware that it offered more mental security than physical.

 

The motion stirred the mage, who, once he realized the elf was moving, sat up sharply to examine Fenris. He sighed in relief. “Thank the Maker, you’re awake,” he murmured sleepily, taking the elf’s hand in his, pressing the lyrium-marked appendage to his cheek. “You’ve been asleep for so long, I was worried…”

 

“How long?” Fenris’ voice was a dry rasp, almost foreign to his own ears.

 

“Nearly two days,” he replied. “That horrible bitch took so much blood…” When he spoke of Adora, his face contorted into pure hate, hands tensing over the elf’s. “She turned to demons in the end, and became an abomination.”

 

“Fasta vass,” he uttered dryly, swallowing hard and painfully against his dry throat.

 

Anders plucked a cup from the small table beside the bed, offering it to the elf, unable to meet his gaze. “Water,” he mumbled.

 

Fenris took the cup, greedily gulping down its contents in seconds. His limbs felt heavy, weakness tainting them. He passed the empty cup back to the mage, who in turn set it aside.

 

“How are you feeling?” he asked, concern crinkling his brow.

 

The elf scowled. “Weak. Where are my clothes?”

 

“Jowan washed them, and we mended your leggings. They’re here,” Anders replied, eyes averted from his.

 

Fenris studied him for a moment, his chest aching with emotion. What he’d gone through with Hadriana...he had not ever thought he would feel such things again. By and large, the mages had stopped her before she had gone far. Still, the memories of his former master’s apprentice haunted him, clarified by Adora’s cruelty. He could still see the devastation on the mage’s face from the corner of his eye, looking on in horror.  “Mage. Why will you not look at me?”

 

Anders caught his breath, wincing as he allowed his gaze to drift upward to meet the imploring green eyes. Fenris found deep sorrow when their eyes met, the mage tensing as the tears standing in his eyes streamed freely down his cheeks. “I’m so sorry. It was all my fault,” he wept.

 

“Some lessons we must learn ourselves, mage,” Fenris spoke gently. “You can take them and allow those lessons to break you, or you can learn and become stronger.”

 

“I would never forgive myself if you paid for my stupidity with your life,” Anders clutched the elf’s hand to his chest. “Or...or if...Maker, she almost…I’ll kill anyone that _ever_ touches you like that again.”

 

The elf shifted uncomfortably in the bedding. He did not want to think about what she’d almost done. Taking the mage’s hand, he drew the man closer to him.  Anders put up no resistance, being drawn down into the comfort of the elf’s arms around him. Fenris held him, unwilling to lie to the mage about no wrongdoing for the sake of comfort, but wanting to offer some measure of comfort to the one who’d intervened to save his life twice now.

 

Their lips met gently at first, Fenris seeking as much to give comfort as to overwrite the memory of Adora taking what was not hers. It was a reminder that his touch was a choice, a flame against the creatures of doubt and terror that whispered memories of slavery in his ear. The kiss quickly deepened, the effect dizzying in a way that Fenris attributed to his recent blood loss.  

 

Anders groaned into his mouth, moving over the elf, straddling him on hands and knees. Fenris slid his hands down over the other’s hips, fisting at the fabric of his tunic. Invigorated by a lust-fueled surge of energy, he jerked the garment upward. The mage broke the kiss for the garment to slip over his head, leaving him in nothing but leggings.

 

“Remove these,” Fenris rasped in command, testing the fabric of the leggings between his fingers. He wanted to feel the mage. He wanted to feel all of him, warm and yielding under his touch, to make him sing out his pleasure.

 

The mage held himself aloft the elf, eyes heavy lidded with desire, a hand reaching down to undo the lacing. His hips rolled forward as he gripped the front of his leggings, pulling firmly downward, stiff cock grinding against his own palm as it was freed. Lifting each leg in turn to slip out of his last garment, he tossed them to the floor beside the bed.

 

Fenris ran his hands up the mage’s thighs, molding to the taut flesh of the mage’s posterior. Anders purred at the touch, peeling back the bedding to expose the rest of the elf’s olive-toned flesh, finely tuned muscle shadowed by the candlelight. Even in the dim light his markings were clearly visible.

 

Anders bit his lip as his gaze fell over his lyrium-marked body, drinking in the sight of him in a way Fenris had not seen before. After a lifetime of frightened glances, terrified staring, and lingering disgust, it felt good to be appreciated in another way. He was not the elf slave, a tool for use, put on display like a bull. He found validation of his personhood in the other’s lascivious gaze, caring and tender in its lust.

 

Amused green eyes gazed back, watching the other’s face. Having not shaved in some time, the mage was developing more of a beard, hair undone and unruly, golden tresses kissing the tops of his shoulders. Fenris reached out a hand to cup his cheek, beard tickling his palm. With recent events fresh in his mind, it was suddenly clear that either one of them could not survive their journey. The unsaid things crawled into the cavity of his chest, swelling it with emotion.

 

“Anders,” he said softly. “I know we often do not see eye to eye, and I...am not always kind or patient. Being quick to anger, clinging to my hatred, was useful for a time. It kept me alive when I spent years being chased down by my former master. It helped me turn the tables and strike back, leading me to meeting Hawke and...you. Yet it has made things difficult between us, and it drove me to...hurting you.”

 

The mage watched him, a bit caught off guard by the sudden outpour. His expression was unreadable.

 

“Should I not get a chance to say this and something should happen, you should know that I will never abandon you. I am at your side, and I will walk with you into darkness,” he fixed his green eyes on the mage’s bewildered ambers, punctuating his sincerity with intensity.

 

Anders closed his eyes, a shiver running up his spine, sending a brief quiver to his lip. When he opened them, he looked down over the elf, tears in his eyes even as he could not help the crooked grin setting a dimple in one cheek. “I think this is the part where I usually wake up.” His smile faded and he looked away. “This...this has all made me realize as well how easily I might have lost you, how it could happen to either of us in the span of a single heartbeat. Living on the run like this...you never know how many breaths away from the end you are. I can’t…” Looking back to Fenris, he lowered his head to touch his forehead to the elf’s, whispering defeatedly, “...I can’t lose you. I need you.”

 

Fenris lifted a hand to pull the mage roughly into a fierce kiss, tongue diving into his hot, yielding mouth. With a whimper, Anders laid himself down over the elf, pressing against him. He was painfully aware of the touch of his body to his own, warmed by passion. With a growl, the elf sharply turned, pulling the mage with him, positioning himself over Anders and between his thighs.

 

The mage wrapped his legs around the elf’s hips, pulling him close. Fenris’ rapidly re-hardening length ground between the firm cheeks of the mage’s buttocks. Anders moaned, a hand intertwining in the silvery white of the elf’s hair. Fenris rocked his hips forward, pressing himself further between the flesh until his head came to rest against the contracting pink pucker nestled betweens the mage’s cheeks.

 

Fenris snaked a hand between them, taking the mage’s own needy shaft between palm and fingers, thumb pressing against the tip to be moistened by pre. He swirled firm circles over its tip, the mage’s back arching, mewling out his appreciation. Anders raked his nails over the elf’s back, leaving angry trails of red in their wake.

 

With a low growl, Fenris pressed himself inside Anders slowly, pre-slickened thumb trailing up and down firmly over the sensitive underside of the mage’s shaft. The mage’s firm grasp on the elf’s hair tightened, pulling at it urgently. Fenris fought to control himself at the bite of pain to his scalp, the urge to plunge himself roughly inward palpable. He shuddered in Anders’ arms, retaking his lips hungrily.

 

When the mage had taken his full length, Fenris would linger for a moment, maddened by the hot warmth cast around him. Dizziness spilled into his skull like a broken vessel and he set a hand down to support himself, steadying him against the spinning overtaking him. He cursed his weakness, furious that it gave him pause now.

 

Anders sensed his discomfort, and set a hand to his chest, pushing him away. “You’re still recovering. You should lie down…”

 

Fenris growled, “I am well enough.”

 

The mage rolling his hips away from the elf, slipping the still rigid cock from him. “Don’t be stubborn. Lie down. We don’t have to stop entirely.”

 

The elf reluctantly complied, flopping onto his back beside the mage with a moody huff, a hand at his temple as if it could still the dizziness and spinning that threatened to make him ill. Anders rose to his hands and knees, moving to straddle the elf as he’d done before. Spitting into his palm, he well coated both his pucker and the elf’s member in slick wetness. Taking the lyrium-touched shaft in hand, he lowered himself onto it, spearing himself with less care than the elf had taken.

 

Fenris drew in a sharp breath between his teeth, hands settling over Anders’ hips. The mage rolled his hips over him, finding a steady pace as he fucked himself on Fenris’ cock. The elf had to admit that he enjoyed watching the mage toil at seeking his pleasure, eyes upon the slightly parted lips.

 

A lyrium-laced hand enclosed around the neglected length bobbing in the air before him, pumping over it slowly and firmly. Anders trembled at the pleasure assaulting him from both sides, spurred to quicken his pace as he rose and fell. Fenris stopped a moment to lick his palm, returning his hand to the mage’s cock. Now slickened, it glided over the flesh easily, velvety and smooth against his calloused hands. He could not help but groan at the feel of it, titillated by the juxtaposition of the sensation in his hand with the constrictive warmth milking him.

 

Goosebumps rippled over his flesh, Fenris bucking to meet the lowering ass of the mage, hips slapping loudly against bottom. His grip tightened over Anders’ rod, steadily coaxing the mage to greater heights of pleasure. The mage could not look away from the hand enclosed over his length, intent on watching the elf’s work.

 

When the elf felt his climax fast arriving, he closed his eyes, focusing hard to keep it at bay. He found it extremely difficult between the quickening pace of the mage and the hot grip around him, trapping him in a cage of bliss.

 

The mage’s eyes glazed over as he began to tremble, his own climax fast approaching. He leaned back, hands set up the bed to hold himself up as he sank himself on Fenris from a new angle. The elf could feel the shift hit the button inside the mage, evident in his cries from his new position. It was not long before he would gasp, seed flooding from him to coat the elf’s hand and stomach, his pace grinding to a shuddering halt.

 

Fenris was not yet done. With a low, throaty purr, he sat up, pushing Anders on his back, legs in the air. He drove himself wildly into the quivering mage, semen-coated hand pressed firmly against the other’s chest, pinning him down. Already lingering near the edge, he found his own release quickly, eyes watering  from the intensity of sensation assaulting him.

 

Dizziness overtook him immediately after, and he collapsed atop Anders, head resting on his chest. The mage’s chest heaved as he struggled to catch his breath, a hand idly sifting through the downy-soft strands of the elf’s hair.

 

The following silence they settled into thereafter was pleasant, but quickly interrupted by a loud growl from the elf’s belly. Hunger hit him heavily and suddenly, an ache he had become familiar with over the years.

 

Anders tensed at the sound. “You ought to eat something. Let me up, and I’ll get you-”

 

“Just...one more moment,” the elf murmured, content enough to ignore his hunger in favor of the pleasant, floating comfort he found himself in. He could hear the steady beat of Anders’ heart through his chest, the rise and fall rocking him like a cradle. He could not recall the last time he was truly content, and he was loathe to leave it so soon.

  
“As long as you like,” the mage replied.


End file.
